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323210 Golden Hollywood Scandals That Were Covered Uphttp://www.10lists.xyz/10-golden-hollywood-scandals-that-were-covered-up/
Thu, 28 Feb 2019 19:30:56 +0000http://listverse.com/?p=388354It may be tempting to think that Hollywood today has reached its lowest point in regard to its ethics and those of its stars. Unfortunately, it seems that the movie business has attracted scandal since its birth. In addition, to maintain the reputation of its stars, studios have always hired fixers, double dealers, and outright […]]]>

It may be tempting to think that Hollywood today has reached its lowest point in regard to its ethics and those of its stars. Unfortunately, it seems that the movie business has attracted scandal since its birth.

In addition, to maintain the reputation of its stars, studios have always hired fixers, double dealers, and outright shysters to do the dirty work for them. Here are 10 scandals from the Golden Age of Hollywood that they tried to cover up.

10 Loretta Young Adopted Her Own Child

Loretta Young had it all. She was beautiful. She was successful. She was recognized, even winning an Oscar for her 1947 performance in The Farmer’s Daughter. And she was hiding a secret.

After she finished shooting The Call of the Wild in 1935, Young disappeared from view. When she returned to public life 18 months later, she brought along her “adopted” daughter, Judy. In fact, the child was her own, the product of a brief relationship with (married) Clark Gable. It is unclear if the relationship was consensual.

Young was a strict Catholic and would not have contemplated aborting the child. The secret was kept from everyone, including her daughter, for 31 years. Although rumors of the child’s true parentage were whispered around Hollywood for years, they were only officially confirmed in a memoir published after the star’s death.[1]

9 Joan Crawford Did A Porno

Joan Crawford was one of MGM’s biggest stars. She was known to be ambitious and somewhat ruthless in her pursuit of her career. She won an Oscar for her leading role in Mildred Pierce in 1945 and received two other Oscar nominations and a host of other awards. Crawford was Hollywood gold.

This must have made the persistent rumors that she had begun her career with roles in porn a little awkward. She is said to have starred in a film called Velvet Lips. At one point, her brother was offering copies to the highest bidder. There are no longer any copies of the film in existence, possibly due to the efforts of studio fixers employed to see that stars were not embarrassed by their indiscretions.

Crawford’s first husband, Douglas Fairbanks Jr., confirmed that she was blackmailed over the films, even receiving threatening calls when they were on their honeymoon. A film was sent to the studio, but the company lawyer denied that the woman in the film was Crawford.

She denied participating in porn films until the end of her life. However, her FBI file (because, you know, McCarthy and all that) appears to confirm the existence of the film. Crawford’s biographers state that “a film of Crawford in compromising positions was circulated . . . to be used at smokers” (men-only stag parties).[2]

They also suggest that the file contains evidence that the studio paid Crawford’s brother as much as $100,000 to stop him from leaking the film. This is supported by mysterious payments made by Crawford to the studio, which are supposedly repayment for the blackmail money.

Crawford’s family problems continued after her death. Her daughter, whom Crawford had disinherited, published a tell-all memoir, Mommie Dearest, which depicted the star in a whole new light.

8 Jean Harlow Was Forced To Marry

Jean Harlow was the original blonde bombshell. She catapulted to stardom after appearing in Howard Hughes’s Hell’s Angels. It is fair to say that Harlow had a tumultuous life. She married her first husband on January 18, 1927, at age 15 and was divorced a few years later. Her second husband was killed in a gunshot accident, though there was much speculation that she had killed him.

Then she had an affair with a married boxer. When the scandal threatened to become public, the studio forced her to marry cinematographer Harold Rosson. However, the marriage was for public consumption only and they quietly divorced a few months later when the scandal was forgotten.

Harlow did want to marry William Powell. She fell for him in 1935 on the set of Reckless and wanted to get married, have a family, and give up acting. But Powell was not reckless. He had just been divorced from Carole Lombard and thought the public might not like him to marry so soon. He also made it clear that he never wanted children.

Powell’s caution, however, only went so far, and Harlow soon found herself pregnant. Knowing that he did not want children and that the studio would not tolerate an unmarried mother, Harlow aborted the baby that she wanted and never told Powell what had happened.[3]

William Randolph Hearst was a businessman, politician, and newspaper publisher. In fact, he was a tycoon with the largest newspaper business in the world, one of the most powerful people in America, and the inspiration for Orson Welles’s masterpiece, Citizen Kane. Hearst was known to be ruthless, hot-tempered, and, occasionally, downright nasty.

So it is fair to assume that he would not have taken news of his mistress having an affair lying down. He believed that Marion Davies was sleeping with Charlie Chaplin. Instead of confronting Chaplin outright, Hearst invited Chaplin and a number of other film people to join Hearst on his yacht. This must have made for rather uncomfortable small talk.

Thomas Ince was a Hollywood producer who specialized in Western films. His studio was profitable for a while, but it began to flounder. Looking for investors, Ince boarded Hearst’s yacht, hoping that the trip would change his fortunes. It did.

The official version of the death—certainly the one that Hearst had printed with indecent haste in his newspapers—was that Ince had developed digestive problems which proved fatal despite his swift hospitalization. Ince’s body was immediately cremated.

Despite Hearst’s vigorous attempts to control the publicity surrounding Ince’s death, rumors kept surfacing that Hearst had shot at Chaplin, missed, and killed Ince instead. Although the Los Angeles Times ran the headline “Movie Producer Shot on Hearst Yacht,” it was swiftly pulled and later editions carried no mention of the shooting.[4]

A secretary aboard the yacht was quoted as saying that he had seen Ince bleeding from a bullet wound to the head. Ince’s wife was unavailable for comment as she had embarked upon a sudden tour of Europe.

6 Tallulah Bankhead Had Multiple Abortions

Tallulah Bankhead was as famous inside Hollywood for her sexual activity as she was for her beauty around the rest of the world. At one point, she was said to have had 185 notches on her bedpost and she hadn’t finished counting.

Knowing that the studios would not have tolerated a pregnant star, Bankhead had four abortions by age 30. She wasn’t the only one. The studios had established protocols for this contingency and booked women into hospitals under false names for vague procedures. They were attended only by their own doctors, and visitors were strictly prohibited.

Bankhead was one of the few regular visitors to the hospital. She was briefly married to a man whose proposal she accepted because “he’s the only one who ever asked me.” It didn’t last.

Her promiscuity was legendary. She had affairs with men and women, often in semipublic places, and made a practice of opening her door to visitors naked. She is even said to have flashed the audience while performing in a Broadway play, causing a priest and three nuns to walk out.

Bankhead is said to have regretted her abortions later in life when she found herself unable to have children due to a hysterectomy performed after she contracted gonorrhea.[5]

5 Patricia Douglas Was Raped

Patricia Douglas was a wannabe star. At 20, she was invited to attend an audition for MGM studios. Unknown to her, the “audition” was a party thrown by Louis B. Mayer for MGM’s sales executives. The party had been in swing for three days by the time Douglas attended, believing that she might be getting her “big break.”

Douglas was not worldly wise. She was a virgin from Kansas City, Missouri, who dreamed of being a star. She was not the only girl invited. In all, around 120 young women were bused in to “entertain” approximately 300 drunken delegates at a remote ranch. Dressed in cowboy hats, short skirts, and boots, the girls were promised a hot meal and $7.50 for the entire day.

Still under the impression that they were taking part in a screen test, the girls had their makeup done and were told to wait on the “set.” Knowing that the film business was difficult and wanting to be professional, they waited for their cue. However, the sales executives believed that the girls were a different sort of professional altogether.[6]

Without transport or telephones, the women had no means of escape and had to fend off the male advances as best they could.

Douglas was brutally raped. Unlike others in Hollywood, she refused to be bought off and chose to press charges against MGM salesman David Ross. MGM hired the Pinkerton Detective Agency to dig up dirt on Douglas. When they could find none, they coerced people into claiming she was a promiscuous woman who had a sexually transmitted disease.

The parking lot attendant initially said that he had seen her being attacked but later changed his mind. Afterward, his children admitted that his later statements were untrue. Douglas’s character was destroyed, and her assailant got away with rape.

4 Errol Flynn Was A Pervert

It’s not a secret that Errol Flynn had a large sexual appetite. The phrase “in like Flynn” was popularized after his trial for the statutory rape of two girls. Flynn was acquitted of all charges, and the trial only increased his reputation as a Lothario.

Flynn began his Hollywood career after working as a river guide for a film crew, fighting off crocodiles, and dodging arrows from headhunters (apparently true). He was spotted and offered a role in a remake of Mutiny on the Bounty.

In addition to Flynn’s predilection for underage girls, other rumors followed him around. It is said that he lost his virginity at age 10. He had a two-way mirror installed in his bedroom and another allegedly in the bathroom.

He was famous for his sexual “experiments” fueled by drink and drugs, but nothing seemed to dampen the public’s enthusiasm for him. Flynn died at age 50 of a heart attack. It is alleged that the coroners at the inquest removed a number of genital warts from the body as souvenirs.[7]

3 Judy Garland Was Forced To Take Drugs

Judy Garland was first spotted by an MGM scout in 1935 as a young teen. They liked her voice and her acting but not her looks. She was signed and immediately began playing girl-next-door roles, working six days a week for up to 18 hours a day. To keep her energy up and her weight down, the studio supplied her with amphetamines. When it came time to stop work, they gave her sleeping pills.

Garland married at 19 against the wishes of the studio and was ordered back to work 24 hours after the wedding. When she became pregnant, they arranged for her to have an abortion.

By the time she began work on Meet Me in St. Louis in her early twenties, Judy Garland was completely reliant on amphetamines. The studio “protected” her by not allowing anyone else near her. When she called in sick, they recouped their lost production costs from her paycheck.

At one point, Garland checked into a hospital to learn to eat and sleep properly again. But when she came out, studio bosses ordered her to lose weight and she went straight back on the pills.

When Garland’s life began to spiral out of control, the studios abandoned her. She died from a barbiturate overdose in 1969 at age 47.[8]

2 George Raft Really Was A Gangster

George Raft specialized in playing tough guys like convicts, crooks, and mobsters. Perhaps it was Raft’s real-life association with mobsters that influenced casting directors. His first role was a coin-tossing henchman in Scarface, which set the precedent for his career. He is known to have had lifelong associations with Mafia men like Owney Madden and Bugsy Siegel.

Raft had grown up in Hell’s Kitchen, a poor area of New York where his best friend, Benjamin “Bugsy” Siegel, taught Raft how to flip coins. Raft admitted to running bootleg liquor operations for the mob. Later, Siegel, a known mobster with movie connections, helped Raft break into the movie business.

The Mafia never seemed to be far away from Raft’s film work. Al Capone even showed the Scarface director how to fire a tommy gun.[9]

1 Alfred Hitchcock Was A Stalker

Alfred Hitchcock was a gifted director, but he was also rather peculiar. Though he was married for 54 years, he claimed to have had sex only once. It didn’t stop him from becoming obsessed with his leading ladies, however. Grace Kelly and Janet Leigh both complained about his controlling nature. He refused to allow them to speak to other cast members or drive to the set with anyone other than him.

But it was Tippi Hedren who really became the focus of his obsession. While Hitchcock was riding high from the success of Psycho, he picked the unknown actress Hedren to star in The Birds. She became an instant star. But she was also tied to a contract with Hitchcock which left her in a vulnerable position.

On the set of The Birds, the director ordered the other cast members not to speak to her or touch her. Meanwhile, he told Hedren that they didn’t like her. He made several advances to her, which she rebuffed. Hedren claims that the scenes where she was attacked by birds were Hitchcock’s revenge.[10]

Instead of using mechanical crows as they were supposed to, he used live birds, which were attached to her by elastic. The birds became distressed and viciously attacked her. Filming one scene with real birds attacking her in a bedroom took five days.

Eventually, she snapped. According to Hedren, Hitchcock was so offended when she called him a “fat pig” and rebuffed his advances that he set out to ruin her. He would not use her again, but he refused to allow her to work for other directors.

When her work on The Birds won an award, he would not allow her time to collect it. Hedren also claimed that Hitchcock actively campaigned against her to prevent a nomination for an Oscar for her role.

Though Hedren continued to work, her career never really recovered.

Ward Hazell is a writer who travels and an occasional travel writer.

]]>Top 10 ‘Star Wars’ Background Characters You Never Even Noticedhttp://www.10lists.xyz/top-10-star-wars-background-characters-you-never-even-noticed/
Tue, 26 Feb 2019 19:20:08 +0000http://listverse.com/?p=388242It may come as no surprise to you that many characters in the Star Wars franchise have elaborate backstories that have been explored in various books, comics, and animated series. If someone has a single line, they get a backstory! If someone pulls focus, they get a backstory! It’s part of what makes the franchise […]]]>

It may come as no surprise to you that many characters in the Star Wars franchise have elaborate backstories that have been explored in various books, comics, and animated series. If someone has a single line, they get a backstory! If someone pulls focus, they get a backstory! It’s part of what makes the franchise so immersive, knowing that everyone and everything you see on-screen has a history.

But what about those characters that don’t pull focus and don’t get to speak? Those that remain firmly in the background. They also have stories to tell, and many of them are surprisingly fun and interesting. So in this list, we’ll explore a few of the Star Wars background characters that you never even noticed!

10 Willrow Hood

Ah, Willrow Hood. It’s mind-boggling how people latched onto such a small background character that appears for less than a single second during one shot in The Empire Strikes Back. Want to spot him? Well, you need to find the scene where the charismatic Lando Calrissian warns the citizens of Cloud City about an impending Imperial occupation. The very next shot is Lando, Leia, and Chewbacca fleeing toward the landing platform containing the Millennium Falcon, and the very last person they run past—the guy carrying an ice cream maker as a prop—is our man.[1]

And what a way to start our list! Willrow is the gold standard of background characters: He has an action figure, a fan club, and an entire story around him and his Rebel sympathizer life. Indeed, every single year, hundreds of people don an orange jumpsuit, pick up an ice cream maker, and cosplay as him at him at various conventions and gatherings around the world. All from less than a second’s worth of screen time.

But despite his popularity, one huge mystery remains: Who played Willrow Hood? Star Wars fans are renowned for their tenacity and relentlessness in their quest for knowledge and lore concerning the franchise, but despite their best efforts over the years, the original actor has never been found.

9 Yaddle

Everyone knows Yoda—small, green, pointy ears, and pretty wise, even though he talks in a funny, backwards kind of way. But did you know that not only was there another of Yoda’s species featured in The Phantom Menace, but this time, it was a female? At only around 500 years of age (as opposed to Yoda’s nearly 900) Yaddle holds a seat on the Jedi High Council, and while she’s in quite a few scenes, she says and does nothing, and there is invariably another character in the foreground pulling focus.

Brought to life by British puppeteer Phil Eason, Yaddle was originally designed and intended to be a young Yoda, which, had it come to pass, would have just gone to show that even grand master Jedi go through that “long hair, don’t care” phase.[2]

8 E.T.

That’s right—don’t adjust your eyes! E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial actually made it onto this list! Everyone knows the little guy from the classic 1982 Steven Spielberg movie, but did you know that he (or at least members of his species) made a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it appearance in The Phantom Menace?

That’s right, in the gripping scene where Senator Amidala calls for a vote of no confidence in the chancellor (thus inadvertently maneuvering the evil Palpatine into power), there are cries of “Vote now!” around the Senate building. As a resigned chancellor slumps down in his seat, the camera cuts to a shot of shouting senators—including a few Asogians, E.T.’s species.

This little cameo was George Lucas returning the favor for Spielberg including Yoda (or rather someone dressed as him) in E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial. That’ll explain why E.T. recognized the Jedi grand master and chased after him shouting, “Home!”[3]

7 Lobot

Women supposedly love the strong, silent type, and in the Star Wars universe, no one does that better than Lobot. Portrayed by John Hollis in The Empire Strikes Back, Lobot is probably the most prevalent character in this list. Working as an aide to Lando Calrissian, he is present in the scene where Han Solo and the gang arrive at Cloud City. He later leads a team that frees Lando, Leia, and Chewbacca from Imperial capture and even has his own deleted scene in which he himself is caught for his role in their escape.[4]

Okay, so maybe they could have come up with a better name—shortening the word “lobotomy” doesn’t quite scream creativity, but he’s a character that has endeared himself to fans. He was originally meant to have plenty of lines, but the filmmakers decided against it, instead taking the view that the mechanical implant around his head had somehow rendered him voiceless.

While canon materials reveal that Lobot went on to have many post-movie adventures, there was very nearly another deleted scene included in The Empire Strikes Back that hinted at the character’s grisly and decidedly more permanent fate. Talk about a close shave!

6 Sim Aloo

What’s more creepy than a creepy old guy with intentions to take over the galaxy? I’ll tell you: the extra creepy silent adviser that the creepy old guy consults with. So much creepy! Sim Aloo holds the title of adviser to Emperor Palpatine and can be seen very briefly in the throng accompanying the Sith lord as he arrives on the Death Star II in Return of the Jedi. He also makes a silent appearance in a later scene in which the emperor meets with his apprentice, Darth Vader.

Played by Anthony Lang, Sim Aloo was a skeletal human who dressed in dark, purple robes with a large, purple hat. So the next time you’re watching Return of the Jedi, keep your eyes peeled for him. Because despite sharing a name with a delicious Indian food, there’s nothing more unsettling than someone who has the ear of the most evil guy in the galaxy.

5 Beezer Fortuna

The first Star Wars spinoff Rogue One brought with it a whole slew of new, interesting, and intriguing background characters. But one that caught many people’s attention was Beezer Fortuna. You might know his cousin Bib Fortuna, the pasty, bi-tentacled Twi’lek majordomo to Jabba The Hutt in Return of the Jedi. Well, despite his wholly unappealing looks, Beezer was more selfless than his cousin, instead choosing to fight the good fight against the Empire as part of a partisan group.[6]

While the actor who played Beezer remains as-yet uncredited, he can be seen briefly during a wide shot as Jyn Erso and Cassian Andor arrive at rebel extremist Saw Gerrera’s hideout. Is it fan-service that we bump into the cousin of a long-established character, thus making the galaxy seem that little bit smaller? In a way, yes, but it’s the kind of connective tissue that fans love!

4 Sarco Plank

Okay, so this one really is a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it character. Less of a background character and more of a background blur, Sarco Plank is a male Melitto who makes his minuscule appearance in The Force Awakens as Finn, Rey, and BB-8 flee the dusty Jakku village from pursuing Stormtroopers. But despite featuring in only a handful of frames, does that stop him from having his own backstory? Nope! He was a foil to Luke Skywalker during his early Jedi training days in the post-A New Hope book The Weapon of a Jedi.[7]

Because of his cool design (senior sculptor Martin Rezard described it as having “a bit of a lobster feel”), toy company Hasbro jumped on Sarco Plank and produced an action figure of the character that was released prior to the film. This, of course, led many fans to question where he was in the final cut, but he’s in there. And if you can spot him—well done!

3 Yarael Poof

We’re jumping back to The Phantom Menace now, and we’re going to talk about Jedi master Yarael Poof. Operated by puppeteer Michelle Taylor, he can be seen in many of the shots inside the Jedi Council chamber. Unlike the previously mentioned Jedi master Yaddle, Yarael Poof is a somewhat more conspicuous character. With his long neck and being seated almost directly opposite Yoda, he can be seen in the background of many shots as Liam Neeson’s Qui-Gon Jinn and Ewan McGregor’s Obi-Wan Kenobi consult with the council.

His exclusion from subsequent films was only down to the fact that his design too closely resembled that of the cloners from Kamino, which were featured prominently in Attack of the Clones.[8] So, unfortunately, it was Yarael Poof’s rather long neck that ended up on the chopping block.

2 IG-88

Perhaps the most widely recognized (by hard-core Star Wars fans, anyway) character on this list, IG-88 can be found during the scene in The Empire Strikes Back in which Darth Vader is ordering bounty hunters to find and capture the Millennium Falcon. Vader grants them permission to use any methods necessary but warns fan favorite Boba Fett not to disintegrate anyone.

To the left of the screen as Fett acknowledges the command is IG-88. The IG-series assassin droid does nothing in the scene other than stand completely still and turn his head slightly. He also appears later as deactivated junk in a Cloud City junk room.[9] Nevertheless, he became a thing of obsession for fans, with countless stories—both canon and non-canon—written about him. And of course, he has an action figure.

And as an extra fun fact, during production, IG-88’s head was built using a part from a jet engine—the same piece that was used as set dressing behind the bar in the famous cantina scene in A New Hope! So even in a galaxy far, far away, they recycle.

1 Nik Sant

We’re going to end this list with a fairly controversial character: Nik Sant. He can be seen during Return of the Jedi in the scene where Han Solo gets an unwitting Scout Trooper to chase him around the corner to be met by the Rebel strike team. The bearded man at the front of the group is Nik Sant.

For the longest time, the bearded guy in that one shot where Han and the Scout Trooper are the focal point was just referred to as Nik, but over 30 years later, we found out that a completely separate character, the aging clone commander Rex (who featured heavily in the animated series The Clone Wars and Rebels) has not only survived but was present during the attack on Endor and may well have been the person we know as Nik Sant.[10] Such confusion!

Speaking about the possible retcon, Dave Flloni, the animation producer and director of the animated series, said, “The one thing I have really thought about is I really do think that Rex is that guy on Endor. I really do. Why else is there a bearded old guy on Endor?” However, several years later, he backtracked, saying he didn’t want to overwrite a preexisting character and would leave it up to the hard-core fans to decide whether this one miss-able background character is indeed Commander Rex.

So there you have it: a list of ten background characters you never even noticed. And this list barely even scratches the surface! Be sure to head over to the official Star Wars Databank or the Lucasfilm-maintained Wookieepedia and discover more hidden characters for yourself! Alternatively, there are a whole range of reference books available that you can delve into to find out more about the good, the bad, and the forgotten of the wonderful Star Wars universe!

Hi, I’m Josh Gill, a freelance writer from South Yorkshire in the UK. I spent time studying music practice and theory at Barnsley College and Journalism and English literature and language at Coventry University before finding a role as a learning support assistant at a local school. So as you can see I’ve covered quite a few bases! Freelance writing aside, I’m a huge Star Wars and Disney fan who spends a lot of time playing music, reading, and filming for Josh and Lauren’s WanderWorks; my daily vlog channel on YouTube.

]]>10 Influential Movies With Dark And Surprising Originshttp://www.10lists.xyz/10-influential-movies-with-dark-and-surprising-origins/
Wed, 06 Feb 2019 15:57:49 +0000http://listverse.com/?p=387091There is a common belief that movies work as escapism from the struggles of real life. Despite the omnipresent scenes of sex and violence, movies are somehow seen as separate from the burdens of life. Movies, however, do not exist in a vacuum. Macabre troubles affect filmmakers just like anyone else; they just use their […]]]>

There is a common belief that movies work as escapism from the struggles of real life. Despite the omnipresent scenes of sex and violence, movies are somehow seen as separate from the burdens of life.

Movies, however, do not exist in a vacuum. Macabre troubles affect filmmakers just like anyone else; they just use their movies to cope. Death constantly pops up in projections because death constantly appears in life. The following are just ten examples.

10 A Peeping Tom Launched Science Fiction Movies

[embedded content]More than 90 years after its release, art of all forms is still shaped by 1927’s Metropolis. Its status as the first science fiction movie of note and its unprecedented production methods are apparently not enough of a legacy. Its continued influence is felt in all of the films that steal iconography from Metropolis. Blade Runner and Tim Burton’s Batman borrow Fritz Lang’s steely skyline of an Art Deco city. Even the movies that rip off Metropolis are iconic. Maria the Maschinenmensch’s robotic frame was a direct visual inspiration for Star Wars’s C-3PO. Madonna and Lady Gaga have similarly copied Maria for their wardrobes. Many forces went into shaping the imagery of Metropolis, but most of the great shots come from director Fritz Lang’s monocled eye for details.

Lang may have directed one of the greatest science fiction movies of all time, but he was not a lifelong fan of the genre. Born into relatively wealthy status, he was discouraged from reading pulp fiction. Justifiably or not, science fiction in the early 1900s was considered literary garbage. The genre was simply unavailable, even if Lang wanted to read it. Lang might not have been interested in sci-fi, but he was certainly interested in watching his house servant undress.[1] When Lang was a teenager, he snuck into his maid’s bedroom to catch a glimpse of her disrobing. He never did get a chance to see her. Instead, he found a stack of penny dreadfuls, including The Phantom Robber. Trying to kill time, he started reading the cheap novels. Upon discovering Lang with the book, his father slapped him in the face and took it from him. Despite the pressure from his dad, Lang’s fascination with science fiction was born.

9 A Serial Killer And A Shock Rocker Paved The Way For The Hangover

Along with Judd Apatow and Adam McKay, Todd Phillips led a movement in 2000s comedy known as “the Frat Pack.” These directors’ sophomoric movies and focus on improvisation became the defining language of Hollywood comedies in the 2000s. The highest-grossing film in this movement was Todd Phillips’s The Hangover. Nobody would accuse a movie with Mike Tyson air-drumming to Phil Collins of being anything more than fun. Yet, that movie would not have existed without the early contributions of John Wayne Gacy.

Long before the Hangover franchise, Todd Phillips was just a struggling student in NYU’s film school. He dropped out to make Hated, a guerilla documentary on controversial musician GG Allin. The notorious punk singer made his reputation by smearing himself with feces and blood onstage. Allin’s concerts were infamous for assaults and violence. Perhaps it is not surprising, then, that one of the artist’s biggest fans was serial killer John Wayne Gacy. Gacy had already been convicted of killing more than 30 teenage boys when Allin approached him with a business deal. Gacy would paint a portrait of Allin, and Phillips would sell the copies. The plan worked. The paintings sales practically financed Hated single-handedly.[2] Shortly before Hated was released, Allin died. In his honor, Hated received a limited theatrical run. The movie became the highest-grossing student film of all time.

Hated ’s financial and critical success allowed Phillips to make another documentary. Not far removed from GG Allin’s vulgar sadomasochism, the next film was about college fraternities. Frat House, though less acclaimed than Hated, was an important step in Todd Philips’s career. At a screening of Frat House at Sundance, Phillips met director Ivan Reitman. Reitman hired Phillips to come on board as a writer for a film he was working on called Old School. Old School helped Phillips land a writing gig on Borat, which got him nominated for an Oscar. Though nowhere as bad as killing as dozens of children, inspiring millions of annoying Borat impressions is a mixed legacy of its own.

8 The Shocking Rape And Murder Behind The First Horror Movie

[embedded content]The German Expressionists strike again. Just as Metropolis holds the debatable distinction as the first great science fiction film, The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari is generally considered the first great horror movie. For any introductory film student, The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari is essential viewing. The historical legacy of Dr. Caligari is hard to overstate. Some consider it the most discussed film of all time. Evoking a shadowy dream world, the macabre mise-en-scene influenced all horror movies to come. Scriptwriter Hans Janowitz knew from experience how terrifying shadows could be.

In 1913, Janowitz was walking through a fair. Along the way, a young lady caught his eye. He followed her for a while, hoping to strike up an encounter. Meandering through the tents, he lost her. Walking back, he heard a noise. There seemed to be sinister laughter among the trees. A man appeared in the shadows, only to quickly disappear moments later. Equal parts scared and disappointed, Janowitz left for home.

The next morning, he read of a young woman named Gertrude who had been raped and murdered at the fair. Janowitz became convinced that this was the girl he met the night before. Of course, it is impossible to know if any real connection existed between the two women. Janowitz became obsessed. He routinely returned to the crime scene out of guilt. He even attended Gertrude’s funeral.[3] While there, he had a feeling that the killer was also present, watching in the darkness. Seven years later, Janowitz manifested the secret presence of death on-screen with his immortal Cesare.

7 Getting Into The Holiday Spirit For Texas Chainsaw Massacre

[embedded content]It should be no surprise that the person who came up with The Texas Chainsaw Massacre might have had some weird ideas. The weirder part is that this tale of young coeds being picked off by a family of cannibalistic murderers was hatched because of the Christmas season.

More annoyed than jolly, Tobe Hooper hated Christmas shopping. Anyone who has screamed in a mall parking lot over someone stealing the last spot understands what Tobe was thinking. One stop on his Christmas shopping trip was the hardware store. Hooper was growing impatient with the large crowd blocking his way. In his desperation, he figured he could just pick up a nearby chainsaw off the rack and chase the people out of the store.[4] Obviously, he did not do it. In that moment, he saw the whole movie in his head. When he got home, he started writing.

With the perfect weapon, all he needed was an appropriate villain. Like the other great precursor to the slasher genre, Psycho, Hooper drew upon the crimes of Wisconsin murderer Ed Gein as a model. The gritty realism of Gein’s story shaped the film. For Leatherface’s defining look, Hooper again drew upon his own life for inspiration. One of Hooper’s friends was a doctor. The doctor confided to Hooper that when he was a premed student, he had access to cadavers to study. Around Halloween time, the doctor went into the morgue and cut off a corpse’s face. When the holiday rolled around, he used the skin for the mask of his costume. In 1974, Leatherface would do the same thing, ushering in the golden age of the slasher movies.

6 The Fraud That Shaped Every Movie Ending

[embedded content]Unlike the other entries on this list, Rasputin and the Empress is not considered a beloved classic. Despite the incredible star power of Hollywood Legends Ethel, Lionel, and John Barrymore, the movie is generally forgotten by the public. Yet, moviegoers everywhere still see the consequences of the film every time they go to the theater. Cinephiles patient enough to stay through the credits will eventually see some variation of the phrase, “This is a work of fiction. Any similarity to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events, is purely coincidental.”[5] As boring as credits can be, few would suspect that the mundane language of this legal rider only exists because of murder and a man wrongly accused of rape.

In 1916, Prince Felix Yusupov was part of the group of Russian aristocrats who organized Grigori Rasputin’s assassination. Furious over the mad monk’s growing influence on the tsar, Yusupov poisoned Rasputin’s meal. A shooting and drowning in the river were thrown in the mix to make sure the job was done. For his role in the murder, Yusupov was exiled to Paris.

When the movie debuted years later, he sued for libel. He didn’t sue that his character was defamed because the film depicted him as a murderer. Instead, he sued over a scene where Rasputin hypnotizes and rapes his assassin’s wife. Because the assassin was Yusupov’s on-screen equivalent, that meant the rape victim’s cinematic equal was Yusupov’s wife, Irina. According to Yusupov, the implication was that the rape lessened Irina’s social value. MGM insisted the scene was based on true events, even though Irina never met Rasputin. Yusupov won the lawsuit. MGM had to pay $25,000, more than the movie cost to make. To ensure that they never had to pay out anything like this again, they slapped the phrase “this is a work of fiction” on every movie since.

5 Incest And Rebel Without A Cause

[embedded content]The fascinating and heartbreaking Rebel Without a Cause should never have existed. In 1944, Dr. Robert Linder wrote a case study about his patient Harold, an inmate at the Lewisburg Federal Penitentiary. Dr. Linder treated Harold with hypnosis to see if he could end Harold’s criminal streak. The final product was a droll scientific analysis, hardly ready for the big screen. Multiple script doctors were brought in along the way, including Theodor Geisel, who would soon write under the more famous pseudonym Dr. Seuss. Geisel quit when it appeared that none of the producers had even read the book. The movie sat dormant for years. In 1954, the project, in chaos, needed a deft hand to rescue it. Director Nicholas Ray provided just that, but he almost assuredly would have preferred to have never gotten involved in the first place.

In June 1951, Nicholas Ray walked in on his wife, Gloria Grahame, in bed with another man.[6] This would have been bad enough for most people. To make matters worse, the person she was with was only 13 years old. To top it off, it was Ray’s own son, Anthony, who’d returned home from military school. A few years later, the whole sordid affair somehow became even more tragic when Gloria married Anthony. Needless to say, Ray was deeply upset. He tried to understand how his son could do something like this. He started reading books on the thoughts of the adolescent mind. He eventually discovered the long-forgotten script and rushed its production. On set, he said that he took the movie to see why he had failed as a father.

When Nicholas Ray came along, he made significant changes to the movie. With Ray’s recent events certainly still weighing on his mind, many people have picked up on the film’s subtle hints of incest between Natalie Wood’s Judy and her father. Ray made an even bolder sexual decision. From a historical perspective, Ray’s choice to have Sal Mineo portray Plato as gay was revolutionary. Plato became the first mainstream gay teenager on film. Ray’s main contribution was portraying James Dean’s Jim Stark as sympathetic. Dean’s last great role before his early death, Jim Stark, was essential in ensuring both the legend of James Dean and the model for teenagers everywhere.

4Animal House Was Originally About Charles Manson

[embedded content]Charles Manson never made it into Hollywood. He tried repeatedly but was rightfully dismissed as a creepy weirdo. He did leave an impact, of course. The murders carried out on August 8, 1969, snuffed out burgeoning stars like Sharon Tate, Jay Sebring, and Wojciech Frykowski far too early. Many movies have drawn upon the murders for inspiration, including Quentin Tarantino’s latest. However, the real legacy would be how the gruesome slayings created one of the most enduring comedies of all time.

Doug Kenney was very eccentric. Co-founder and head writer for National Lampoon magazine, Kenney had liberty to pitch any idea he wanted. In his personal life, however, Kenney was struggling. He had been going through a divorce after his rampant adultery, left works for months at a time, and became a chronic drug abuser. Matty Simmons, creative head of National Lampoon, thought that making a movie would give Doug some purpose in this period. Kenney and another National Lampoon writer, Harold Ramis, took that freedom and ran with it. When they returned, they handed Simmons a zonked-out spec script called “Laser Orgy Girls.”[7]

The story followed Manson’s antics while he was in high school. In the script, the hypnotic cult leader has multiple gang rapes along the way in his quest to meet aliens in the desert. Simmons objected to the idea. He thought that gang rape was inappropriate for high school but would be fine in college. With not a lot of time, Ramis and Kenney invited their friend Chris Miller onboard. The three just swapped their craziest college stories until something landed. Many of those stories later appeared as scenes or elements of the movie, like the horse dying in the office or a frat brother named “Pinto.”

Animal House was a huge success. For a while, it was the highest-grossing comedy in film history. Unprecedented popularity made Kenney even more neurotic. He fell back into drug use. Two years after the release, Kenney committed suicide by jumping off a cliff in Hawaii. He was 33.

3 Mr. Toad’s Tragic Ride

The happiest place on Earth may be Disney World, but it certainly wasn’t Disney’s studios. In 1941, the Disney writers went on strike. All movies except an adaption of Kenneth Grahame’s 1908 book Wind in the Willows stalled production. Walt Disney hated the book and thought it was a waste of money. Disney did not have a lot of money to waste.

Part of the studio system, Disney in the 1940s was in financial trouble. A mix of internal struggles and wartime rationing hurt the company, so much so that there were talks of getting rid of the animation wing entirely. Facing economic and studio pressure, animators whittled the film down to just 25 minutes. It was shelved for years, until it was haphazardly slapped onto a retelling of Washington Irving’s The Legend of Sleepy Hallow. Partially due to its turbulent production process, The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad was released in 1949 to tepid response. Disney had to change.

The movie marked the end of the studio package era of Disney. In the 1950s, Disney focused more on live-action movies and less on animation. Yet, the character of Mr. Toad is still associated with Disney in the public consciousness today, thanks to the Disneyland attraction Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride. Operating since the park’s debut in 1955, passengers follow along with Mr. Toad as he recklessly drives a vehicle, narrowly avoiding hitting people. It is cruelly ironic that Mr. Toad’s inspiration did not have the same luck.

Mr. Toad and the rest of the Wind in the Willows characters came out of bedtime stories Kenneth Grahame (pictured above) told his son, Alastair. Mr. Toad, in particular, was directly modeled after Alastair. Mr. Toad was spoiled and used his wealth foolishly. Kenneth hoped Alastair would pick up on the similarities and change his ways. He did not. The relationship between the two only got worse. Growing tired of Kenneth’s tales, Alastair simply ignored his father. As a teenager, his rebellions grew darker. He requested that his dad call him “Robinson” instead of Alastair. Robinson was the name of a man who tried to kill Kenneth for working at a bank. Not content with simply emotional harm, Alastair repeatedly put himself in physical pain. Torturing both drivers and his dad, Alastair had a hobby of running in front of cars to see if they would stop.[8] He eventually graduated to lying in front of trains. The trains did not stop. One ran over him as he purposely lay on a railroad track, decapitating him instantly. He was 20.

2 The Murder Behind The Iron Giant

[embedded content]Over the past two decades, Brad Bird has helmed multiple critically acclaimed blockbusters like The Incredibles, Ratatouille, and Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol. Yet, his most celebrated movie is also his least successful. Criminally ignored upon its release, The Iron Giant took years to find an audience. Those who discovered it were treated to a beautiful allegorical tale of a boy and his Earth-destroying robot. Disturbing the alleged tranquility of its 1950s setting, The Iron Giant serves as a powerful examination of nuclear anxiety, militarization, and violence in general. Pretty heavy themes for a kids’ movie, but Brad Bird was on a personal crusade. He understood all too well how violence can ruin lives.

The attempt to rationalize violence came out of a family tragedy. Before he was set to meet with Warner Brothers, Brad Bird’s sister was shot by her estranged husband. The murder forced Bird to examine how one could commit such a meaningless act. He asked himself the philosophical question, “What if a gun had a soul?”[9] This thought changed the whole direction of the source material. The robot in Ted Hughes’s original book, The Iron Man, is a Christlike figure who sacrifices himself for humanity. Brad Bird’s reinterpretation depicts the titular robot not as someone who suffers but as someone who could cause suffering if they wanted. The emotional resonance appears in the movie in a much smaller way, too. In her honor, the closing credits simply read, “For Susan.”

1 The Cannibal Who Made The First Zombie Movie

[embedded content]There’s an old expression saying to write what you know. Therefore, it almost makes sense that the person who started the zombie trend in America also liked to consume human flesh. William Seabrook was a man of many titles: explorer, writer, and, shockingly, cannibal. Seabrook first expressed his obsession with cannibalism in his book Jungle Ways. Set in the Ivory Coast, Jungle Ways interweaves Seabrook’s travels with mysticism. Holding a very myopic view of the locals, he repeatedly asked tribes if they practiced cannibalism. None did. When he adamantly asked for human flesh, they feed him baboon instead. Unpleased with the substitute, his search for flesh took him to France. Thanks to some backroom dealings with a morgue operator, he secured a human thigh. He threw a party to celebrate his new meal. In the middle of the celebration, he took out the thigh and ate it in front of everybody.

This was not Seabrook’s first encounter with a corpse. Before Jungle Ways, he wrote about watching decomposing bodies in The Magic Island. Seabrook’s book details Haitian voodoo practices. One particular account about a rumor of people coming out of their graves and the village that had to put them down stayed with Seabrook. He watched as the disfigured bodies of a long-deceased couple were desecrated.

Writing about these trips changed the movie industry. The Magic Island, an immediate best seller, helped bring the word “zombie” into the popular lexicon. “Zombie” became a fixture of American horror when The Magic Island was adapted into the 1932 movie White Zombie.[10] Focused more on voodoo magic than screaming hordes, White Zombie is nevertheless an important step in the creation of our contemporary notion of the zombie.

Appropriate for a founder of horror, Seabrook’s life was tragically dark and surreal. He worked alongside famed occultist Aleister Crowley. Interested in sadomasochism, Seabrook chained women up in his basement for days at a time. In the last years of his life, he used his alleged magical powers to place a death hex on Hitler. His embrace of the bizarre left him ostracized by the rest of New York’s literary circles. Ashamed by the criticism, he became depressed. Increasingly unable to handle the judgment, he turned to drugs and alcohol. In 1945, he committed suicide by purposely overdosing. He was 61.

Nate Yungman likes movies. He does not like death. You can follow him on Twitter @nateyungman. If you want to send a comment or question, e-mail him at [email protected].

]]>10 Movies Based On True Events That Don’t Tell The Truthhttp://www.10lists.xyz/10-movies-based-on-true-events-that-dont-tell-the-truth/
Fri, 23 Nov 2018 00:49:49 +0000http://listverse.com/?p=382682Turning things that happen in real life into movies has always been a good option for filmmakers, as everyday life is sometimes more astonishing than any invented story could be. However, despite using real people and events as a basis, many of these movies end up heavily revising the facts. Sometimes, the changes are not […]]]>

Turning things that happen in real life into movies has always been a good option for filmmakers, as everyday life is sometimes more astonishing than any invented story could be. However, despite using real people and events as a basis, many of these movies end up heavily revising the facts.

Sometimes, the changes are not very important and are simply to structure the events in a cinematic way. Other times, they are much more significant, and we could even go so far as to say that they distort the truth. These are ten movies that stretched the notion of “artistic license” to the absolute limit.

10The Imitation Game

[embedded content]This 2014 film tells the story of Alan Turing, a brilliant mathematician who was recruited by MI6 during World War II to help crack coded messages sent by the Nazis but whose life was later destroyed by a conviction for homosexuality. The facts of the story provide both the thrills of watching someone use his gifts to solve complex problems at a time of national emergency as well as the tragedy of his later destruction due to unjust laws, making it perfect material for a fascinating film. Thus, it is hard to see why the filmmakers chose to add a completely invented subplot.

The film portrays Soviet spy John Cairncross as a member of Turing’s code-breaking team and has Turing find out about Cairncross’s betrayal of his country, only for the latter to blackmail him into keeping quiet by threatening to reveal the truth about his sexuality.[1] In reality, while Cairncross was at Bletchley Park at the same time, the two were not in the same unit, and Cairncross stated in his autobiography that he did not meet with anyone outside of his own work colleagues for reasons of security. This part of The Imitation Game turns Turing into someone who would let down his country and the Allies to save himself, which is pretty ironic for a film that is supposed to be about restoring his reputation.

9Young Man With A Horn

[embedded content]Young Man with a Horn is a movie from 1950 that tells the story of jazz trumpeter Bix Beiderbecke, but it would be fair to say that it takes some serious liberties with the facts of his life. Perhaps we shouldn’t expect too much from a film that renames Beiderbecke “Rick Martin,” but the strange part of the movie is the way it incorporates the darker aspects of Beiderbecke’s life— most notably his alcoholism—but then invents a happy ending for him.

In the movie, the trumpeter is played by Kirk Douglas. He falls in love with singer Jo Jordan, portrayed by Doris Day, and it is eventually her love that saves him from his self-destructive behavior. There is no evidence that such a relationship was part of the life of the real Bix Beiderbecke, who died at the age of 28, as a direct result of years of heavy drinking.[2] The film is an adaptation of a 1938 book of the same name, written by Dorothy Baker, which has an ending closer to what actually happened. So it would seem that this is simply an example of Hollywood’s fondness for redemption narratives and love stories.

8Birdman Of Alcatraz

[embedded content]This 1962 movie starring Burt Lancaster is considered something of a classic and received four Oscar nominations at the time. It tells the story of Robert Stroud, who is given a life sentence for murder and kept in solitary confinement. Beginning by caring for a sparrow that he finds at his window, he develops a fascination with birds that leads him to study and research them, which helps him conquer his violent impulses and rehabilitate himself.

That Stroud was a killer, his solitary prison existence, and the fact that he became an expert on ornithology are not disputed (he wrote the highly regarded Digest on the Diseases of Birds), but there are serious question marks over whether this changed his character to quite the extent that the film suggests. The real Robert Stroud never displayed any repentance for his violent crimes, and he remained far more capable of violence than we are led to believe by the film, despite educating himself. The title of the movie could also be considered a bit misleading, as Stroud’s work with birds took place during the time that he was jailed at Leavenworth Prison. After he was moved to Alcatraz, he was denied the right to keep birds.[3]

7Churchill

[embedded content]When this 2017 dramatization of Winston Churchill during the final hours before the D-Day landings was released, the film was given a very harsh review by King’s College professor and Churchill biographer Andrew Roberts. His full review details all of the historical inaccuracies, with probably the biggest being the depiction of Churchill as opposing Operation Overlord right up until the day it took place. In reality, there is evidence from the diary of General John Kennedy, who was a senior officer involved in the operation, that Churchill had overcome any doubts he had about it by the time of the last briefing on May 15.[4]

Roberts also points out that Churchill would have had the constitutional power to overrule the plan if he had really been as doubtful about it as he is in the film, because he was both the minister of defense and prime minister of the UK at the time. So we can assume things didn’t happen in quite the way that they do on the screen.

6Bonnie And Clyde

[embedded content]This film has become iconic and stars Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway as the legendary criminal couple. It mixes moments of comedy and romance with heavily stylized violence that was completely different from anything shown in a Hollywood movie up until that time, marking the beginning of the New Hollywood period. Bonnie and Clyde still gets written about a lot, but there is not much mention of how it bends the truth, especially in the way that it portrays Frank Hamer. He was the Texas Ranger who pursued and eventually killed the duo, and the film turns him into a buffoon motivated by revenge after being captured and embarrassed by them.

In reality, Hamer was a highly respected figure who opposed the Ku Klux Klan in Texas and fought to prevent the lynching of African American men.[5] He had never encountered Bonnie and Clyde before successfully ambushing and killing them, making his humiliation by them in the movie—and desire for vengeance—a fabrication by the filmmakers. His son and his widow were so angry at the depiction of Hamer that they sued the creators of the film, who settled with them out of court four years later.

5The Inn Of The Sixth Happiness

[embedded content]This 1958 film starring Ingrid Bergman and Robert Donat has been a family favorite for decades. However, it could not really be described as truthful in telling the story of a British maid named Gladys Aylward and her missionary work in China before World War II. We probably shouldn’t blame the filmmakers for the fact that the real Aylward was a small, dark-haired woman who looked nothing like Ingrid Bergman—after all, not many of us look like movie stars. They also bent the truth in more serious ways, though, as the staunchly religious Aylward was very upset by the decision to include a romantic relationship in the movie that was not a part of her real story.

The ending of the movie, which shows Gladys abandoning her missionary role and leaving the children behind to be with her lover, Captain Lin Nan, was also not true. In reality, Aylward stayed in China and continued her religious work there until she died in 1970.[6] Of course, it could be argued that the single worst distortion committed by the makers of the film was casting a white English actor—Donat—in the role of a half-Chinese man.

4Buster

[embedded content]The Great Train Robbery that took place in the UK in 1963 is a great subject for a serious and in-depth movie, but Buster is definitely not that movie. It tells the story from the perspective of one of the robbers, Buster Edwards, but the fact that it features the pop singer Phil Collins in the role is an indication of how lighthearted the tone is. When it was released in 1988, some film reviewers criticized it for playing down the darker parts of the story to make it into a family-friendly comedy drama.

The film excludes some pretty important facts about the actual robbery, including the violent assault on the driver of the train, which at least one biographer of the crime has stated was carried out by Edwards.[7] What makes this movie different from many of the others on this list is that the gloss it put on the truth was controversial, even at the time that it came out. Prince Charles and Princess Diana opted not to attend the premiere at the last minute due to outrage among much of the press in the UK, who argued that the film was glorifying violent crime.

3The Diving Bell And The Butterfly

[embedded content]French movie The Diving Bell and the Butterfly is about Jean-Dominique Bauby, the editor of Elle who was left as a quadriplegic after suffering a stroke. It is based on his memoir of the same name but makes some radical changes in bringing the story to the screen, some of which seem difficult to understand. Bauby was separated from his wife, Sylvie de la Rouchefoucauld, when he got sick, but the film depicts her as the person who visited him in the hospital and helped him write his memoir. His lover stays away from the hospital because she is too weak to cope with what has happened.

In reality, the woman he lived with at the time of his stroke, Florence Ben Sadoun, visited the hospital several times every week and was the one who helped him go through the painstaking process of transcribing his book using a system based on the only part of his body that he could move—his left eye. While the changes that the director, Julian Schnabel, made to the real story angered a lot of Bauby’s friends, they did not prevent the film from winning a Bafta and a Golden Globe, as well as being nominated for Oscars.[8] Ben Sadoun did eventually publish a book called The False Widow so that she could challenge the version of the story that the movie tells.

2The King’s Speech

[embedded content]The King’s Speech is a period drama from the UK telling the story of the battle of the future King George VI to overcome a stammer and be able to speak in public in the period just before World War II. It was a massive hit at the box office around the world and won several awards—including Oscars for Best Film, Actor, and Director—but it also messes with the real history a lot in the name of drama. The central relationship between the king-to-be and his speech therapist, Lionel Logue, is one that definitely existed in real life, but it began over a decade earlier than it does in the movie.[9]

We could argue that setting the personal crisis being experienced by George against the national crisis of impending war makes for better cinema, but there are other times when the changes to the real story are a bit harder to justify. An example of this is the picture it paints of George’s brother, King Edward VIII, which plays down his enthusiasm for the Nazi Party and fascism in general as well as his belief that the UK should try to appease Hitler—even after the war had actually started. Furthermore, the plot of the movie has Winston Churchill accepting the decision of Edward to abdicate the throne as being the most sensible course of action, whereas we now know from letters the two sent to each other that he actually tried hard to prevent this from happening and never forgave Edward for his decision to abdicate.

1Frost/Nixon

[embedded content]It might seem oddly appropriate for a film about Richard Nixon to be a bit slippery with the facts, and Frost/Nixon from 2008 certainly doesn’t present its true story in a totally honest way. The movie is about the famous series of interviews that British presenter David Frost conducted with the disgraced ex-president in 1977, and it managed to annoy quite a few people with its inaccuracies. One of the scenes in the movie which was criticized for that reason was the one where Nixon telephones Frost late at night while drunk. Jonathan Aitken, who wrote a biography of Nixon, dismissed this sequence as an invention by the filmmakers.

More seriously, though, the way the climax of the interviews was depicted onscreen also received criticism from another biographer of Nixon, Elizabeth Drew, who pointed out that it altered Nixon’s words to make it appear that he had confessed to being involved in a cover-up over Watergate, when, in fact, he denied it.[10] For a movie that is based on real events and real people to create its major moment of drama out of something that did not happen might be pushing the idea of artistic license a bit too far.

I am a freelance writer who makes short films under the name Wardlaw Films and have previously written radio sketches and jokes.

]]>10 Horror Movies On Netflix That Don’t Suckhttp://www.10lists.xyz/10-horror-movies-on-netflix-that-dont-suck/
Wed, 24 Oct 2018 14:54:49 +0000http://listverse.com/?p=381051Halloween is approaching rapidly, which means you need to get all of your scary movies in before December hits. (Then it’s time to start binge-watching Christmas movies). So raid your video cabinet, hit up some midnight showings, and check Netflix. Not so keen on that last option? This list details ten movies that can all […]]]>

Halloween is approaching rapidly, which means you need to get all of your scary movies in before December hits. (Then it’s time to start binge-watching Christmas movies). So raid your video cabinet, hit up some midnight showings, and check Netflix. Not so keen on that last option?

This list details ten movies that can all currently be found on Netflix and aren’t cheesy scary! Seriously, some of these films have actually made some of their viewers faint. Don’t worry, though, this article includes a variety of movies with different types of horror within. From blood and guts to demons and ghosts, this last packs a scream!

10The Conjuring

[embedded content]Directed by James Wan, the story of The Conjuring has terrified people since its premiere date back in July 2013. The story is based on the case files of Ed (Patrick Wilson) and Lorraine (Vera Farmiga) Warren, two demonologists who take on the cases most people avoid. Ed and Lorraine help a family whose home has been infested with a nasty demon that just won’t go away. When the family realizes who the demon is targeting, things get harder to handle.

Netflix can tell when people stop watching a movie. The Conjuring is on their list of movies people often can’t finish due to its horrifying story, with many stopping after 70 percent of the movie has been played.[1] (Netflix believes that if viewers simply didn’t like the movie, they’d have stopped watching sooner.) Thankfully, Netflix has this movie for us to enjoy as much as we can before we turn it off out of fear.

9The Boy

[embedded content]Many people have a fear of dolls—because why wouldn’t they? Their lifelike glass eyes, painted-on smiles, and ghostly stares are enough to make the hair on anyone’s neck stand up. Director William Brent Bell gave us his masterpiece of a movie, The Boy, back in January 2016. The Boy takes place in a remote English village where an elderly couple are in search for a nanny for their young boy. However, things take a turn when the main character (Lauren Cohan) meets their son, who is really a life-sized porcelain doll.

Staying away from demons or gore, The Boy has a way of scaring the crap out of you just by the use of the doll.[2] Oh, and the music. Make sure you hide anything that resembles a doll in your house before streaming this movie on Netflix.

8Hush

[embedded content]Imagine living in a house alone, surrounded by woods. Now, picture all of that but not being able to hear. In the movie Hush, directed by Mike Flanagan, the main character Maddie (Katie Siegel) is in for a terrifying night when a man decides to break into her home and terrorize her. Maddie is deaf and unable to hear a single thing going on around her. She has to try to use the element of surprise in order to attempt to rid herself of this intruder.

This intense thriller even managed to earn an 89 percent on Rotten Tomatoes. Many people agree that this movie is unique, chilling, and something that continues to keep you guessing until the very end.[3] Search for Hush on Netflix if you’re looking to enjoy this unique thriller.

7The Unborn

[embedded content]Going back to demons and possessions, The Unborn takes us through a terrifying experience. Directed by David S. Goyer, this movie is one hour and 27 minutes of pure horror. The main character Casey (Odette Yustman) seeks help after countless nightmares and visions suddenly start coming to her. When she finds out that her nightmares are actually the result of a family curse dating back to Nazi Germany, things go from bad to worse. Casey begins to see the demon that is trying to take over her life, that is getting stronger and stronger with each possession.

Goyer takes full advantage of using a child to make the movie scary. After all, thanks to many horror films beforehand, kids have without a doubt been proven to be downright terrifying if they are used in the right way.[4] Netflix has this movie for all of you who are dying to be terrified for an hour and a half.

6It Follows

[embedded content]Everyone knows what it’s like to have that “first love” type of romance. Most of the time, this kind of thing would fall into the romcom genre of movies. However, for director David Robert Mitchell, this fell in the horror genre. The movie It Follows hit theaters March 2015 and has had people questioning every person they see ever since. The film is focused on the young teenager Jay (Maika Monroe), who decides to sleep with her boyfriend Hugh (Jake Weary) for the first time.

Kind of romantic, right? Well, this turned out to be the worst decision she could have made. An evil (and creepy) entity was attached to Hugh, and the only way he could get rid of it was by having sex. Jay, who is now stuck with the creepy, shape-shifting demon following her, is on a mission to find someone to pass it onto. Viewers agree that this movie has you questioning every character until the very end, and then you get to question everyone you see as you leave the theater.[5]It Follows is now on Netflix for anyone looking to be scared while falling in love.

5The Collection

[embedded content]Okay, now we’re getting into the gory stuff; grab your buckets and brace yourselves. Director Marcus Dunstan gave us his horrifying film The Collection in November 2012. The movie introduces us to the main character, Elena (Emma Fitzpatrick), sneaking off to join a very exclusive party. Of course, things don’t go as planned. We get taken through the Collector’s dungeon of horror, where we (unfortunately) see what he has in store for Elena.

With pop-outs coming at every chance partnered with the intense chase scenes, this movie has every viewer at the edge of their seat until it’s over. The Collection is actually a sequel to Dunstan’s 2009 film The Collector,[6] and on top of that, Dunstan was the one who brought us four Saw movies! The man has a knack for making us hurl our lunches. For all of you gory movie lovers, The Collection is streaming on Netflix now.

4The Shining

[embedded content]“Here’s Johnny!” Oh, did I say “Johnny?” I meant here’s Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining. Based off the Stephen King novel, the classic horror movie hit theaters in May 1980. Jack Nicholson plays the main character, Jack Torrance, a writer who becomes a winter caretaker for a hotel located in Colorado to try and focus on his writing. During the winter, the hotel becomes completely isolated, which would drive anyone in their right mind insane. Jack begins to see and hear things that make him lose all sense of reality.

Although the movie has received mixed feelings due to the changes Kubrick made from the book,[7] most people can agree that the chilling looks Jack Torrance gives his family throughout the entire film are enough to have you running for the hills. Netflix has this available for anyone looking to enjoy a horror classic.

3 Hellraiser

[embedded content]In the 1987 classic horror movie Hellraiser, directed by Clive Barker, we all learned a little something about opening up portals to different dimensions. Okay, maybe you’ve gotten lucky and opened up a box you got from your trip abroad and nothing happened. But when the main character, Frank (Sean Chapman), opens up his souvenir, he is met with a man who has the face of a pincushion and is ready to terrorize him and turn his life into Hell.

Just like The Shining, Hellraiser got mixed reviews, depending on what people were looking for. If you’re looking for something classically horrifying, with the suspense setting your heart rate through the roof, Hellrasier is the movie for you. Even Stephen King agreed that Barker was to be considered the future of horror.[8] And who are we to argue with the King of Horror? Netflix has this classic available for streaming, so what are you waiting for?

2Would You Rather

[embedded content]Would you rather watch a scary movie with demons chasing the characters or one with people trapped inside a mansion with a psycho guy making them do horrible dares to themselves and others in order to win a big pile of cash? Well, if you picked the second one, David Guy Levy’s Would You Rather is the film for you. In the 2012 thriller/horror movie, the main character Iris (Brittany Snow), along with other people, are forced to join a game where they have the chance to win a large bucket of cash. The only catch is that they have to perform seemingly deadly tasks to themselves or other people in the room in order to stay in the game.

This movie is something you can’t start watching lightly. In other words, if you can’t handle blood and screams, perhaps you should turn to one of the other films mentioned in this list.[9] However, for those of you who can sit through a thriller like this and keep your lunch down, this movie (now available on Netflix) is the right choice for you!

1Gerald’s Game

[embedded content]What better way to end our list than with a Netflix original movie, Gerald’s Game, based off the novel written by Stephen King. Director Mike Flanagan took it upon himself to bring this story to life. Staring Carla Gugino as Jessie Burlingame and Bruce Greenwood as Gerald Burlingame, this movie starts off with what everyone thinks is going to be a sexy, romantic moment. However, once the you-know-what hits the fan, nothing about this movie would lead anyone to think it’s going to be anything other than a horror film.

Gerald and his wife Jessie go on a weekend retreat to try to rekindle their sex life. Unfortunately, Gerald unexpectedly dies, and Jessie ends up being alone in the isolated house, handcuffed to their bed. Yikes, talk about a rough weekend.

Unlike most horror movies, Gerald’s Game uses the sounds of Jessie’s wrists and legs popping and creaking as a way to scare the viewers instead of intense music. This was reportedly enough to cause some viewers to faint.[10] Obviously, this movie is available for all of you who want to “Netflix and chill” during the Halloween season.

I’m a college student that is majoring in English and minoring in Writing! I am currently writing a novel and working with Wattpad to get the right promotions going and getting it published on their website, so if you want to read some of my writing in the near future, I’ll be on there!

]]>10 Child Stars Who Ruined Their Liveshttp://www.10lists.xyz/10-child-stars-who-ruined-their-lives/
Tue, 23 Oct 2018 14:53:40 +0000http://listverse.com/?p=380993Many children dream of being famous singers or movie or TV actors. But the harsh reality of having your name in lights at such a young age is nothing like the dream. Some kids just can’t handle stardom. As these 10 stories of well-known child stars show, the riches and fame can lead kids down […]]]>

Many children dream of being famous singers or movie or TV actors. But the harsh reality of having your name in lights at such a young age is nothing like the dream.

Some kids just can’t handle stardom. As these 10 stories of well-known child stars show, the riches and fame can lead kids down a path of drug addiction and other illegal behaviors. They may lose everything and ruin their young lives. It’s enough to make us reconsider whether being rich and famous is really worth it.

10 Lindsay Lohan

Born in New York City in 1986, Lindsay Lohan was first recognized by the public for her starring role as the twins in Disney’s remake of The Parent Trap. She then rose higher to fame during her roles in 2003’s Freaky Friday and 2004’s Mean Girls.

However, stardom did not do any favors for Lohan. As her fame grew, she began appearing in New York nightclubs and her life quickly devolved into a stream of negative publicity in the tabloids.

In 2007, Lohan was arrested after she crashed her Mercedes-Benz into a tree. Two months later, she was arrested again for being involved in a car chase during which she was also found to be in possession of cocaine. The result of this was two counts of driving under the influence and one count of reckless driving. She received the minimum sentence of four days in jail, although she only had to serve one.

Later in 2007, Lohan checked into rehab as required by her recent sentencing. When she was released, Lohan said that she wanted to stay sober and “out of Los Angeles.” After managing to stay clear of the press for a few years, she reappeared after being sentenced to 90 days in jail for missing a DUI hearing. In 2011, she was charged with the theft of a necklace from a jewelry store.[1]

Since her scrapes with the law, she has managed to stay out of the tabloids aside from the time when she was bitten by a snake in Thailand in 2017. Her current projects include the Lohan Beach House club in Mykonos, Greece, and a second club in Rhodes.

9 Amanda Bynes

Amanda Bynes appeared in her first commercial at age seven before moving on to stage productions including Annie, The Secret Garden, and The Sound of Music. Following this, she landed a role in Nickelodeon’s TV series All That while simultaneously hosting her own program The Amanda Show.

From there, her success kept growing. She soon starred in a number of roles, including her part as Holly on the WB sitcom What I Like About You. Unfortunately, her fame went to her head and she soon found her face printed on the front of tabloids for all the wrong reasons.

Shortly after her “retirement” in 2012, Bynes was involved in a car accident with a police vehicle. She was arrested and charged with driving under the influence. She was then involved in two more hit-and-run car accidents and caught driving with a suspended license after her car was impounded.

In 2013, Bynes was arrested for drug use in her New York City apartment lobby after reports that she had thrown a bong out her apartment window. For this, she was charged with reckless endangerment, drug possession, and tampering with evidence.

Later that year, she reportedly started a fire near a residential driveway in California and was placed on psychiatric hold. Later, she went into a rehabilitation center. In 2014, she appeared to have turned her life around. However, not long after getting her license back, she was charged with driving under the influence and placed on psychiatric hold again.[2]

Fortunately for Bynes, she has finally managed to regain control of her finances and straighten out her life. She took time off from the tabloids to mend family relationships and showed interest in other hobbies, namely at a fashion design school. People Magazine has confirmed that Bynes is in a “happy and healthy place in her life” as of August 2018.

8 Britney Spears

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Born in December 1981 in Mississippi, Britney Spears landed her first major TV role at age 11 starring in The All-New Mickey Mouse Club. This success came after being rejected at her first audition at age eight.

In 1995, she began to focus on her music career and was quickly signed by Jive Records. They produced her first single, “ . . . Baby One More Time.” By 1999, the single had reached the top of the charts after the release of a controversial music video with Spears in a skimpy outfit.

Over the years, Spears began shedding her innocent girl image and building a mature career with which she could continue to grow. She performed her hit single “I’m a Slave 4 U” at the MTV Video Music Awards, drawing more attention as she danced with a python in a revealing costume onstage.

In 2004, Spears married a childhood friend and then annulled the marriage, all within a few days. Several months later, she married her backup dancer Kevin Federline, who had previously left his pregnant girlfriend to be with Spears. In 2005, they announced that their first child would be born in April of that year. From there, Spears’s life quickly went downhill.

In 2006, she was caught driving with her son on her lap. This led to national headlines questioning her ability to be a parent. She was accused of sending horrible messages to her fans despite her excuse that she was merely trying to get away from paparazzi.

She gave birth to their second son only two months before filing for divorce from her husband. Then she began hanging out at the club scene and reportedly checking in and out of rehabilitation. In 2007, Spears shaved her head before checking into a treatment center.

Shortly after she released another single to attempt a comeback, she was charged with a hit-and-run accident in a local parking lot. She underwent a psychiatric evaluation and spent some time in the hospital before making her debut in a triumphant return.[3]

In 2008, she released her next album, Circus, which made it to the top of the charts and marked the beginning of her comeback. She then took a role as a judge for the popular singing show, The X Factor, before heading back into the music scene to work with big names like Iggy Azalea. She appeared to be fully recovered as she ventured on her #PieceOfMe tour.

7 Brian Bonsall

Brian Bonsall was born in 1981 in California and grew up acting in Hollywood from a very young age. From 3–14 years old, he played roles in a variety of shows and movies, including Family Ties, Star Trek: The Next Generation, and the Disney film Blank Check.

In 1995, Bonsall took a break from acting and attended high school in Colorado. There, his passion for punk music developed. He began performing in punk bands, including Late Bloomers and Thruster.

Unfortunately, his life took a turn for the worse as he was arrested for driving under the influence. In 2007, he was arrested for assaulting his girlfriend and pleaded guilty to third-degree assault. This resulted in a two-year probation sentence.[4]

However, this didn’t mark the end of Bonsall’s troubles. Between 2007 and 2010, he was arrested on a number of drug possession and minor assault charges that were all highly publicized due to his stardom. In 2009, he beat a friend over the head with a broken wooden stool while under the influence and was given another two years’ probation after being charged with felony menacing and third-degree assault.

Now living in Boulder, Colorado, he is pursuing a career in music by playing rhythm guitar in Lowjob, a local punk rock band. He is also a part of acoustic duo Bootjack & Bonz.

6 Drew Barrymore

Born in 1975, Drew Barrymore landed a major role at age six in Steven Spielberg’s blockbuster E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial. Her career exploded in the 1990s as she starred in Poison Ivy, Guncrazy, Bad Girls, and Boys on the Side.

She also developed a vast character portfolio by starring in low-key films like The Wedding Singer, Ever After: A Cinderella Story, Never Been Kissed, and Confessions of a Dangerous Mind. She became one of the most talented actresses of her generation. However, life hasn’t always been easy for Drew Barrymore.

At age nine, her mother started taking Drew to nightclubs during the absence of her alcoholic father. It was in these years that a young Barrymore became familiar with the effects of drugs and alcohol. At just 13, she violently attacked her mother in an attempt to throw her out of the house. As a result, Drew was placed in a rehabilitation center.

After a subsequent suicide attempt, she went back to rehab and returned to her home life completely sober at age 14. To try to reclaim her life, she filed successfully for emancipation at 15 and moved into her own apartment with a job at a local coffee shop.

Drew took another wrong turn at age 19 by posing naked for the infamous magazine Playboy. Following the issue’s release, she received a quilt and a note from Steven Spielberg for her 20th birthday telling her to cover up. The note was accompanied by Photoshopped images from the magazine which had been edited to have clothes on them.

This triggered her journey to cleaning up her act for good. She now has a balanced life and is extremely successful in the film industry. Drew discusses her dark history in her autobiography, Little Girl Lost.[5]

5 Shia LaBeouf

Born in 1986 in California, Shia LaBeouf is best known for his starring role as Sam Witwicky in the Transformers movies. He began his career by doing stand-up comedy in his hometown before being inspired by a friend in the film industry. LaBeouf instantly began looking for an agent and auditioning for parts.

As well as his Transformers role, he is also known for his parts in Disney Channel’s Even Stevens and in the 2003 movie Holes. He won a Daytime Emmy Award for his performance with Disney which sparked the beginning of an incredible career. However, he also had a troubled childhood.

Coming from a financially unstable family, LaBeouf suffered mental and verbal abuse at the hands of his father, who had developed a substance abuse problem. While it is said that this drove LaBeouf’s desire to be in the entertainment industry, the abuse must have taken its toll on such a small child.

In 2005, at age 19, he was arrested and charged with assault after he threatened his neighbor with a kitchen knife. LaBeouf then proceeded to ram the neighbor’s car with his own, claiming the neighbor was blocking LaBeouf’s path to the garage.

In 2007, he was arrested again after being asked by security to leave a Walgreens store and refusing to do so. Following this incident, he failed to appear in court and faced a $500 fine.[6]

Not long after this, he was involved in a car crash and required three surgeries to fix his hand. He faced charges for driving under the influence and had his license suspended. Unfortunately, the last time LaBeouf appeared in the media was due to plagiarism accusations involving three graphic novels he had written.

4 Demi Lovato

Born in 1992 in Albuquerque, Demi Lovato landed her first role as a child star alongside Selena Gomez in Barney & Friends. From there, she was cast in a part on Disney Channel’s As the Bell Rings before landing the starring role in the Camp Rock series. It was during the filming of Camp Rock that she found her passion for recording, and since then, she has climbed the music charts.

In 2008, not long after Camp Rock wrapped, Lovato began filming Princess Protection Program, another Disney movie, with her good friend Selena Gomez. Then Lovato landed her own Disney TV show, Sonny with a Chance, which ran until 2011.[7]

While rising in the film industry, Lovato was also climbing the music ladder with her albums Don’t Forget and Unbroken. From there, her stardom was ever growing. But what did we miss along the way?

While on tour with the Jonas Brothers in 2008, Lovato began using cocaine. She has since admitted that she couldn’t go more than an hour without it. Due to this addiction, she would smuggle drugs onto planes, doing lines in her seat while neighboring passengers slept or using drugs in the bathrooms.

Despite her growing substance abuse problem, she was still compassionate. In 2009, she teamed up with Selena Gomez, Miley Cyrus, and the Jonas Brothers to record a single to raise money for charity.

In 2011, she accepted that she had a problem and admitted herself to rehab where she was treated for bulimia, self-mutilation, and “self-medicating” with drugs and alcohol. It was during her rehabilitation that she was diagnosed with bipolar disorder.

After sobering up in 2013, she detailed her experiences in a book, Staying Strong: 365 Days a Year, in an attempt to help other young people struggling with addiction. She states that this book provides young readers with “lessons, meditations, reflections, and daily goals.”

3 Justin Bieber

Justin Bieber was born in 1994 and raised in Ontario, Canada. Growing up, he always had an interest in music. Bieber taught himself to play a number of instruments, including guitar, drums, piano, and trumpet.

His rise to stardom began when his mother started posting videos of Justin performing on YouTube. His account grew, and people fell in love with him. Eventually, his videos caught the attention of talent agent Scooter Braun. The agency helped a young Bieber to obtain a record deal.

His first single, “One Time,” was released in 2009 and became a worldwide hit, going platinum in Canada and the US. This was quickly followed by the release of his debut album, My World, which was also successful on an international level. My World 2.0 was released in 2010 along with his concert film, Justin Bieber: Never Say Never. However, the fame went to his head and his behavior became questionable.

His first run-in with the law came in 2011 when Bieber was just a teen. A woman claimed in a lawsuit that the 17-year-old star was the father of her child. Fortunately, DNA tests proved the pop star’s innocence and the lawsuit was quickly dropped. This was merely the beginning.

In 2013, Bieber was accused of spitting on his neighbor after making threatening comments. Shortly after, there were a number of complaints about his dangerous driving in the residential area. Later that year, he was in the press again after he was recorded urinating in public and yelling obscenities about former President Bill Clinton.

Bieber’s last big run-in with the law was in 2014 when he was arrested for drag racing and driving under the influence. He remained in custody until he was able to post bail and was further charged with resisting arrest.[8]

2 Aaron Carter

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Aaron Carter, brother of Backstreet Boys’ Nick Carter, was born in 1987 and followed his older brother into the music industry. At age seven, Aaron began as lead singer for the band Dead End before making his solo debut as the opening act for the Backstreet Boys two years later. The performance landed him a record contract, which led to the release of his first single, “Crush on You.”

In 1997, his first album was released and went gold in Norway, Spain, Denmark, Canada, and Germany. His next album, Aaron’s Party, was released in 2000. A huge success, it reached triple-platinum certification in the US. His music career also opened a number of doors in the acting industry, where he landed roles in Lizzie McGuire, Sabrina, the Teenage Witch, and 7th Heaven. But scandals were going on behind all this success.

In 2008, Carter was arrested for speeding in Texas and the police found marijuana in his car. In 2009, Carter secured a place on Dancing with the Stars. However, his stage fright led him to become addicted to Xanax, which he was using to relieve his anxiety.[9]

Three years later, still addicted to the prescription drug, he was coerced to enter a rehabilitation program by his brother, Nick, and their mother. Unfortunately, it was the death of his sister from a drug overdose which drove him to sobriety in 2012. In 2013, he filed for bankruptcy to clear his $3.5 million of debt. He is now clean and back on track financially.

1 Macaulay Culkin

Macaulay Culkin is one of the most renowned US child stars. He was born in 1980 in New York City and came into contact with showbiz at age four by appearing in a number of Off-Broadway shows. At age eight, he appeared in the films Rocket Gibraltar and See You in the Morning.

In 1990, he starred in his greatest film, Home Alone, directed by Chris Columbus. Home Alone became one of the highest-grossing movies of all time and resulted in a sequel.

At age 14, Culkin starred in a number of low-rated films. The public became skeptical as to whether the child star, who was the highest-paid star of his age, had already peaked. This led to questionable behaviors by Culkin which further tarnished his once-perfect reputation.

The lead-up to his role in the sequel of Home Alone resulted in allegations that his father, Kit Culkin, was mismanaging his fortune. This was later confirmed as his parents entered into a custody battle during which it seemed that they were more interested in their son’s fortune than in their son.

In 2004, Culkin was arrested for possession of 17.3 grams of marijuana along with a stash of other controlled substances. Culkin was “demonized” by the press for his drug use despite the many other child stars who had spiraled much further than he ever did.[10]

For a while, Culkin performed with a Velvet Underground parody band called Pizza Underground. They performed covers of songs featuring lyric changes about the topic of pizza.

Traveler and aspiring freelance journalist. Check out my stories on Medium. Contact me for collaboration at [email protected] or on Twitter.

]]>10 Times Directors Went Too Far On Sethttp://www.10lists.xyz/10-times-directors-went-too-far-on-set/
Mon, 22 Oct 2018 14:43:20 +0000http://listverse.com/?p=380938Making movies is an art form that takes a ruthless and creative mind to oversee. To make sure it all comes together correctly for an enjoyable experience for the audience is left up to one position on set. The director controls all the film’s artistic and dramatic aspects. This is the person who visualizes the […]]]>

Making movies is an art form that takes a ruthless and creative mind to oversee. To make sure it all comes together correctly for an enjoyable experience for the audience is left up to one position on set. The director controls all the film’s artistic and dramatic aspects. This is the person who visualizes the script while leading the crew and talent in the fulfillment of that vision. But while most of them keep things under control, for the most part, certain individuals have been known to have gone too far on set.

Working under a difficult boss is a misfortune most of us have endured at some point in our lives. Difficult directors are a dime a dozen, and the things they do to get their artistic visions across can be mind-boggling. Sometimes, these moviemakers believe it is necessary to put the picture’s stars way outside their comfort zone, in more ways than one, in the pursuit of realism. Risking actors’ lives, harassing performers, and even a few deaths have been the result of a filmmaker’s insane ambition. Out of Hollywood’s long history, here is a list of ten times filmmakers definitely crossed the line.

10 Josh TrankFantastic Four (2015)

Fans were very excited to see the highly anticipated Fantastic Four reboot. The initial teaser looked like a Chris Nolan film, which had people thinking it could be as good as 2005’s Batman Begins and start an epic new take on the franchise. The film’s director, Josh Trank, coming off the hit movie Chronicle, was poised for a sophomore success with a solid cast and big studio behind him. Unfortunately, the world would soon find out that there was really nothing fantastic about Trank being in the director’s chair for this one.[1]

When the film’s start date began approaching, Trank began to make many changes to the movie that started to worry the studio. After these creative difference, Trank upped the ante on his odd behavior by having one of cinematic history’s greatest temper tantrums on the production. This was followed up with the filmmaker exhibiting abusive behavior toward the cast and crew. He was even reported to have clashed with actor Miles Teller on set, which almost resulted in a fistfight. The director then took his anger off set and did $100,000 worth of damage to the residence he was staying at during filming.

While most of the filmmakers on this list went on to make a successful movie after their troubles, that is not the case for Trank. Fantastic Four was both a critical and financial failure that pretty much killed the franchise for now.

9 Francis Ford CoppolaBram Stoker’s Dracula

Francis Ford Coppola is notorious for being a ruthless filmmaker. Some would say he is difficult to work with; others just say he doesn’t let people push him around. One thing is for sure: The guy knows what he is doing behind the camera. This is the person who made The Godfather, a project from which he was nearly fired. So it is safe to say that if you are an actor, you know what you are getting into if you sign up for one of his pictures. He will go to whatever lengths necessary to get realism from his actors. And while this does translate to a great film with amazing performances, some of the tactics taken to achieve this are not pretty.

Winona Ryder, who starred in Coppola’s Dracula film, claimed she was subject to some serious verbal abuse in order to make her cry and have a nervous breakdown during a scene. Ryder recounted the grim tale to E! News about how actor Keanu Reeves and Coppola shouted terrible things to her, including calling the actress a whore.[2] After more than a dozen takes, Ryder was understandably drained and could not do it anymore. But by then, Coppola’s over-the-top tactics had worked, and he had gotten what he wanted, leaving poor Ryder wrecked over the whole thing. Surely, there has to be a better way to get a performance out of an actor that doesn’t lead to extreme emotional distress.

8 David O. RussellAmerican Hustle

Being a director means you need to take charge and make sure everyone knows who is the boss. Some filmmakers are more demanding than others because, let’s face it, a lot of money is often involved, and many complex things have to get done. So there is always a fine line to walk when determining how to manage the workflow on set. But certain individuals become so tyrannical during production that it begins to wear on the people around them, some more so than others, case in point being director David O. Russell on the film American Hustle with an incident involving actress Amy Adams.

Before American Hustle, Adams had previously collaborated with Russell on his 2010 film The Fighter, for which she would earn her third Oscar nomination. Her next encounter with Russell would be later described as horrendous. The actress did a spread in GQ in 2016, in which she revealed that the infamous director made her cry on set.[3] There were days where the actress felt so devastated that it came home with her and did not sit well. It was also revealed in a hacked Sony e-mail that Adams was so abused one day that co-star Christian Bale had to step in and intervene. The actress claimed that she does not think Russell’s methods are worth the box office and awards buzz. I think we all agree that as much as we love movies, life is more important, so no one’s life should suffer for the final cut.

7 David O. RussellThree Kings

Unfortunately, David O. Russell’s madness on set did not start with American Hustle but actually spawned back in the 1990s on the set of Three Kings. His bad reputation would continue to spiral with the film about American soldiers attempting to steal Saddam’s gold. The director completely lost his composure and proceeded to take out his frustrations on pretty much everyone on the set. This led to several members of the production being humiliated and a now-infamous altercation with actor George Clooney.

Claims from the set of Three Kings are not good and further illustrate the director’s poor behavior when at the helm of a film. Russell made a script supervisor cry and physically pushed an extra. He then went on to scream at a cameraman, leaving him extremely embarrassed in front of the entire production. When Clooney attempted to stop the director from these actions, it immediately resulted in the two having a physical altercation on set.[4] Clooney vowed never to work with Russell again, and the director continued making movies, including American Hustle, where he did his best impression of the guy who directed Three Kings. It’s sad when the real villain of the movie is the guy calling, “Action!”

6 Rupert SandersSnow White And The Huntsman

Most times when a director pushes the limits of his position, he can hurt many people on set. But by giving in to reckless temptation, he can end up doing damage to those he loves. A director hooking up with an actress is nothing new in Hollywood. But if the actress is dating a popular actor, and the director has a wife and kids, things can get pretty messy. While most of the naughty stuff happened off set, it’s pretty obvious where the sparks started to fly on this one. The incident in question is, of course, 41-year-old director Rupert Sanders and his little fling in 2012 with 22-year-old actress Kristen Stewart during the production of Snow White and The Huntsman.[5]

The actress was known to show up early every day on set, and a slew of photos of the two having a makeup marathon began to spread once they surfaced online. This prompted a large distraction for the film as well for both parties involved. Stewart’s boyfriend, Robert Pattinson, was devastated by the actress’s actions. The couple had a large following due to their Twilight fame, and some serious fan backlash began over this situation. The director’s wife has since divorced him, and Sanders will always have this looming over his career. All this unnecessary stress for a few moments of impulse. This is a perfect example of why filmmakers should keep things professional on set and never go too far with anybody in any way.

5 Vincent GalloThe Brown Bunny

Everyone loves when a director makes a film, and it feels unbelievably real, staying with the viewer long after the credits roll. You can easily escape into the world they have built and become infatuated with the story being told. When you have a great project, actors and actresses will sometimes do their own stunts or even do a nude scene if it means getting the feeling of authenticity to the audiences. Director Vincent Gallo attempted to take his indie film The Brown Bunny to the next level in terms of realism, and the critics at the film’s premiere were astonished that the director would go that far, allegedly in the name of art.

Actress Chloe Sevigny starred alongside Gallo in The Brown Bunny, and one point in the film has the two being very intimate. Gallo wanted to extract as much realism as he could for the scene so that the audience could really resonate with this intimate moment. So the director had Sevigny actually perform fellatio on him during the shot. This had the critics at Cannes in an uproar, and the film received a very negative response. Actress Cheryl Tiegs wishes Gallo did not include the scene. Her co-star, Sevigny, believes the scene is beautiful and not gratuitous.[6] The Brown Bunny star has bounced back from the infamous scene and has gone on to win a Golden Globe for her work on HBO’s Big love. Gallo, however, has not directed a feature-length film since 2010, according to his Internet Movie Database page.

4 Alfred HitchcockThe Birds, Marnie

The 1960s were a very different time in Hollywood. People got away with things they’d be strung out to dry for in today’s society. During that time, there were many great names of cinema, but none could really touch the majesty that was Alfred Hitchcock. The iconic filmmaker is seen as a legend with his classic hits Psycho, Strangers on a Train, and Dial M For Murder. But just like his pictures, there was a dark side to the story of Hitchcock. Marnie and The Birds were supposed to be dark tales on screen, but one sinister plot was unraveling behind the scenes with Hitchcock and actress Tippi Hedren.

Hedren has stated that Hitchcock was very inappropriate, giving uncomfortable hugs to the actress and incessantly groping her.[7] He even sent her a bag of bread with a card that read “Eat me.” She stated that she went to Alma Reville, the filmmaker’s wife, to get him to stop. Hedren claims Reville just walked away. Hitchcock would also tell her about silly dreams of the two running away together. This sounds like the lunacy of one of Hitch’s psychotic characters and is easily a prime example of when a director crosses the line. Men could get away with all kinds of harassment back in those days, especially on a film set, something that has recently been brought into the spotlight and will hopefully begin to cease.

3 Bernardo BertolucciLast Tango In Paris

Last Tango in Paris is known for having one of the most infamous rape scenes in film history. The film starred Marlon Brando, who was 48 years old at the time, and Maria Schnieder, who was only 19. The scene entailed Brando’s character using a stick of butter as a lubricant before forcing himself on Schneider’s character. The director, Bernardo Bertolucci, stated in a 2013 interview that he wanted her to act humiliated and wanted her reaction to look authentic. He then dropped the bomb that he never told Schneider about the scene, which means she never consented to the sexual act. So what this boils down to is that the rape scene in Last Tango in Paris is an actual rape.

This backed up claims from Schnieder when she sat down for an interview in 2007, during which she said she felt raped after the scene by both Brando and Bertolucci, who both went on receive award nominations and prestige for their roles in the film.[8] She then went on to reveal that the scene led her on a path of self-destruction involving drug abuse and suicide attempts. Poor Schnieder was unwillingly subjected to what can only be described as a horrific act that left the actress traumatized, all for a few minutes of realism on screen. There is no question that Bertolucci went way too far on this one.

2 Quentin TarantinoKill Bill: Volume 2

Quentin Tarantino is no stranger to controversy, and his films have always been a bit too extreme for the average moviegoer. The director has a massive following, and fans have spent years enjoying his titles with a cult-like obsession. To get that type of following, Tarantino is very demanding of his actors, pushing them to their limits to bring his unique characters to life. But these expectations led to the infamous director making a very bad call that could have cost actress Uma Thurman her life while filming a scene in Kill Bill: Volume 2. It was revealed by the film’s stunt coordinator that Thurman was not informed of any stunt happening that day, and the setup was not up to protocol, resulting in an almost fatal car crash.

It is crazy to think that Tarantino would put one of his most valuable players as well as his muse in such danger, but it really went down, and it inevitably led to a malicious cover-up. Thurman does believe that Tarantino is remorseful about the whole thing but firmly stands by her statement that the negligence was to the point of criminality.[9] The fact that several safety parameters were not met wasn’t the malicious act; the cover-up that followed was and left a sour taste in the mouths of everyone involved in the incident. The accident had the actress feeling broken, leaving her with a concussion and serious damage to her knees. If Uma hadn’t been so lucky, there could have been another death by decapitation within the Kill Bill saga.

1 John LandisTwilight Zone: The Movie

Twilight Zone: The Movie was released in the summer of 1983. The film, based on the hit TV series, had four directors, including John Landis, who helmed classics such as Animal House, Trading Places, and Blues Brothers. His venture into the infamous zone ended in tragedy on the last day of production, as the set of the sci-fi horror film suffered a helicopter crash that ended the lives of two children and the chapter’s lead actor. The scene took place during the Vietnam War, where a helicopter chased the two Vietnamese children. The pilot ended up losing control as a result of an explosion going off, leading to the three deaths. Landis and three other crew members were charged with involuntary manslaughter.

This was the first time in history that events during the making of a movie resulted in a director receiving a criminal charge.[10] Landis had cut corners by not attaining the proper permits for the child actors to work, as well as paying them under the table, and did not get the special waiver for the children to work in a scene with explosives. He also committed several labor violations connected with several others involved in the incident. This all lead to a preventable tragedy.

After a lengthy trial, Landis and the others were acquitted and eventually settled civil disputes with the victim’s families for undisclosed amounts. Landis was at the helm, so the responsibility lay with him in making sure his actors and crew are safe at all times. His reckless actions resulted in two children not going home to their parents and actress Jennifer Jason Leigh losing her father Vic Morrow, all for, of all things, a lousy Twilight Zone movie. This is one moment in the franchise’s history with an ending that is more heart-wrenching than bizarre. I think we can all agree that no movie is worth losing life over.

If you know of any other times filmmakers crossed the line and went too far behind the scenes, please let us know in the comments below.

D.J. Rivera is an award-winning writer, director, and producer with several of his titles available on Amazon Prime Video. When he’s not making movies, this go-getter lends his talents to several popular outlets, writing about everything that matters in the entertainment industry and producing solid content for his distinguished client base.Website: ProducedByDJR.comInstagram: @ProducedbYDJRTwitter: @ProducedByDJRAmazon Prime Films: https://amzn.to/2J4xgCc

]]>10 Of The Oldest Surviving Silent Horror Movieshttp://www.10lists.xyz/10-of-the-oldest-surviving-silent-horror-movies/
Mon, 15 Oct 2018 13:55:59 +0000http://listverse.com/?p=380422The term “horror” wasn’t coined until the 1930s, but elements of the genre can be traced all the way back to silent trick films of the 1800s. Trick films used experimental techniques to show special effects, and they often touched on supernatural topics such as ghosts, witches, and vampires. Many of these early experiments with […]]]>

The term “horror” wasn’t coined until the 1930s, but elements of the genre can be traced all the way back to silent trick films of the 1800s. Trick films used experimental techniques to show special effects, and they often touched on supernatural topics such as ghosts, witches, and vampires.

Many of these early experiments with horror have since disappeared, either from damage or being lost throughout the years. However, some of the most influential silent horror films are still available to watch today.

10Le Manoir du Diable

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The name Georges Melies is synonymous with silent films. Known to many for his 1902 film A Trip to the Moon (Le Voyage dans la Lune), Melies was an early experimenter with camera techniques, special effects, and many horror motifs that are still widely used today.

Melies began his film career in 1896. That year, he made Le Manoir du Diable (“The House of the Devil”), released in the United States as The Haunted Castle.

With a running time of around three minutes, the film opens with a bat flying around a castle and then transforming into the demon Mephistopheles. A cauldron appears, and he produces a beautiful woman from it. Suddenly, two cavaliers interrupt him. He tries to scare them off by producing a skeleton, ghosts, and numerous old witches, but he is ultimately driven away by one of the cavaliers approaching him with a crucifix.

Despite its comedic elements, Le Manoir du diable is widely considered to be the first horror film and possibly even the first appearance of a vampire. For decades, the film was presumed to be lost until 1988 when a lucky shopper found it collecting dust in a Christchurch, New Zealand, junk shop.[1]

Georges Melies went on to create several other silent fantasy and trick films that contained early elements of horror. These included Une Nuit Terrible, where a man’s sleep is interrupted by a giant bug climbing up his wall, and The Astronomer’s Dream, where a giant Moon eats an astronomer’s telescope and numerous people climb in and out of its mouth.

9Bluebeard

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In 1901, Georges Melies continued his exploration into horror with Bluebeard, perhaps the first movie about a serial killer. The film is based on the French fairy tale “Bluebeard” written by Charles Perrault, the same man who wrote “Cinderella,” “Sleeping Beauty,” and “Little Red Riding Hood.”[2]

In about nine minutes, the film tells the story of a creepy old man looking for a new wife. His previous seven wives have all disappeared without explanation. A father allows his daughter to marry the old man, and she moves into his castle. She is told she can explore any room in the castle except one.

Naturally, the first thing she does when she’s alone is sneak into that room. She opens the door, feels her way through the darkness, peels back the curtains to let in some light, and turns around to see seven dead bodies hanging from hooks and dripping with blood.

The film is an excellent example of technical skill and the ability to craft a narrative that translates well on-screen.

8The Haunted Curiosity Shop

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In 1901, British director W.R. Booth directed The Haunted Curiosity Shop. The film involves an old curio dealer who finds that the objects in his shop suddenly have a life of their own.

He is confronted by a floating head, a skeleton, a ghost, and a disembodied woman who reconnects the two separate pieces of her body. Like other silent films in this early era, The Haunted Curiosity Shop contains many horror elements without directly intending to frighten the audience.

Before entering the film industry, Booth had previously worked as a magician, and he used The Haunted Curiosity Shop to display all his best tricks and techniques. In 1906, he started his own studio in an outdoor garden. There, he produced the first British animated film, The Hand of the Artist.[3]

7The Infernal Cauldron

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In 1903, Georges Melies returned to the familiar theme of horror with the film The Infernal Cauldron (Le Chaudron Infernal).

The film shows a green demon throwing three people into a cauldron. Each time a person is thrown in, a giant streak of fire erupts. Shortly after, the three people emerge as ghosts. They turn into balls of fire and chase the demon around until he jumps into the cauldron himself.

Le Chaudron Infernal is one of many films where Melies had each frame colored by hand. Coloring film prints was one of the first production jobs available for women in the industry, and he repeatedly worked with a French company that employed over 200 women as colorists.[4]

Around this time, Melies began to struggle with piracy. Yes, film piracy existed all the way back in 1903. One of the most notorious culprits was American film pioneer Siegmund Lubin, who sold illegal copies of Melies’s films.

To fight back, Melies developed a camera that filmed with two lenses. That way, he could create two negatives of the film, one for domestic release and one for international. Modern film researchers made an unexpected yet delightful discovery that this two-lens invention easily translates his films into 3-D.

6Frankenstein

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In the early 1900s, film studios were already looking to books for inspiration. Numerous books were given the movie treatment, and one of the first literary horror films ever made was Thomas Edison and J. Searle Dawley’s Frankenstein.

The 1910 adaptation faced heavy criticism from religious groups and people questioning the moral compass of the industry. Edison responded by removing any scenes or content that might “shock” the audience. He also included a disclaimer at the beginning of the movie telling the audience that it was a loose adaptation of the book.

The silent film was presumed to be lost until the 1980s when a Wisconsin man named Alois Felix Dettlaff announced that he had a copy.[5] Perhaps the 1980s were destined to be the decade of finding lost silent films. In 1993, Dettlaff held a screening of the film at the Avalon Theater in Milwaukee, but it’s now available for anyone to watch online.

5L’Inferno

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The 1911 silent film L’Inferno was Italy’s first full-length feature film. As the industry slowly transitioned to longer movies with more powerful narratives, L’Inferno stood out as a major success. In the US alone, it earned $2 million.

At 68 minutes in length, this adaptation of Dante’s Inferno was a drastic change from the shorts of the late 1800s that lasted a few minutes at most. The film has been heavily praised for its lavish set design and costumes that look like they came straight out of a painting. In 2004, it was released on DVD, this time with a new score by Tangerine Dream.[6]

4Dr. Jekyll And Mr. Hyde

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Maybe studios were low on ideas, or maybe it was an obsession with this twisted tale. But over 10 different film adaptations of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde—as well as several parodies—were produced between 1900 and 1920. The first was produced in 1908 and has been deemed America’s first horror film. But it has since been lost. The oldest surviving adaptations are Lucius Henderson’s in 1912 and Herbert Brenon’s in 1913.

Brenon’s Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde was distributed by The Universal Film Manufacturing Company, Inc., which later became Universal Studios. This was the first horror film for Universal. They would go on to become a staple in the genre with their classic monster movies like Frankenstein and Dracula from the 1930s.

The most acclaimed silent Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde is the 1920 version starring John Barrymore. Barrymore was heavily praised for his astounding transformation between Jekyll and Hyde, a feat he achieved without makeup. Instead, he relied solely on twisting his facial features to change between characters.[7]

3The Student Of Prague

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The Student of Prague is a 1913 German horror film considered to be the first independent film. The plot is a unique blend of Edgar Allan Poe’s “William Wilson,” Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray, Alfred de Musset’s “The December Night,” and the German legend of Faust.[8]

The Student of Prague is about a young man named Balduin who falls in love with a countess. He doesn’t pursue her because he is poor. One day, a sorcerer named Scapinelli says that he will trade Balduin 100,000 pieces of gold for something in the young man’s room. Desperate for cash, Balduin agrees. Then he watches in horror as Scapinelli chooses to take his reflection from the mirror.

The film had a heavy influence on the German Expressionist movement. Upon release, it was applauded for its camera techniques (especially those used to create a doppelganger), themes, and art form. It was also praised for sparking renewed interest in psychoanalysis, specifically Sigmund Freud’s theory on “The Uncanny.”

The Student of Prague was remade in 1926, 1935, and 2004. But none of those versions holds the same cultural significance as the original from 1913.

2The Avenging Conscience

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Like a few other films on this list, The Avenging Conscience or “Thou Shall Not Kill” looked to literature for inspiration. This time, it combined traits of Edgar Allan Poe’s “Annabel Lee” and “The Tell-Tale Heart.”

In the movie, a young man falls in love with a woman but his uncle forbids him from pursuing her. He becomes haunted by dark thoughts of death, which lead him to murder his uncle and hide the body behind a wall. After repeated encounters with his uncle’s ghost, the young man drifts into hallucinations and madness.[9]

The film was directed by the polarizing D.W. Griffith, who went on to direct the infamous 1915 film The Birth of a Nation. That Civil War story included actors in blackface and portrayed the Ku Klux Klan as the “saviors of the postwar South.” The film was heavily protested, but Griffith’s talent for storytelling and camera direction was evident.

1The Cabinet Of Dr. Caligari

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Perhaps one of the best-known silent films of all time, The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920) is an influential part of modern horror. Like The Student of Prague, Dr. Caligari is a part of the German Expressionist movement. It is known for its innovative use of bizarre shapes and warped shadows to create nightmarish visual effects. Roger Ebert went as far as to call it “the first true horror film.”

In the film, a man visits a local fair and sees an exhibit called “The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari.” It contains a man named Cesare who has been asleep for 23 years. He sleeps in a coffin with the doctor seated next to it. After a man is murdered and a woman is abducted, people start to suspect that the doctor and Cesare are to blame.

The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari is an exploration into psychology and has become an essential part of film studies around the world. It made such a lasting impact on film noir and the genres of horror and science fiction that we can still see its influence today.[10]

In addition to being a huge fan of the horror genre, I also have a soft spot for poetry, which I post on my Instagram and Twitter @writingdrea.

]]>10 Forgotten Halloween Specialshttp://www.10lists.xyz/10-forgotten-halloween-specials/
Thu, 04 Oct 2018 11:02:19 +0000http://listverse.com/?p=379861Everyone loves a good Christmas special. But when it comes to Halloween, the choices feel sparse. Anyone can throw on a horror movie, but those can be too nightmare-inducing for kids (and even some adults).

What do people watch when they like getting into the spooky spirit? Just the Treehouse of Horror episodes on The Simpsons or It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown?

Actually, there are so many Halloween specials that are just forgotten. Here are some of the best Halloween specials—not Halloween episodes of television shows but stand-alone specials—to find and enjoy this season.

10Mad Monster Party?

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Rankin and Bass were the masterminds behind Christmas classics Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, Jack Frost, Frosty the Snowman, and many more. In the mid-1960s, fresh off the success of Rudolph and the Willy McBean and His Magic Machine theatrical film, they dabbled in a Halloween special.

This wasn’t just a silly special. This was a full-length film that showed obvious psychedelic influence with its original rock soundtrack and stellar voice talent. It starred Boris Karloff, Allen Swift, Phyllis Diller, and Ethel Ennis. The cast of characters included Frankenstein, the Mummy, Count Dracula, the Werewolf, and more.[1]

The film uses Rankin/Bass’s classic “Animagic” style of animation to tell the story of a gathering at Dr. Frankenstein’s castle where he has invited his monster friends and his human nephew. It’s a trip that’s worth the watch.

9The Flintstones Meet Rockula And Frankenstone

Halloween episodes of cartoons don’t count for this list, but this was considered a very special Flintstones program that was apart from the regular show canon. It aired like a TV movie on October 3, 1980, on NBC.[2]

Fred and Wilma win a vacation from a game show called Make a Deal or Don’t to visit Count Rockula’s castle in Rocksylvania. They take Betty and Barney along for the trip where they unwittingly learn that Rockula is making a Frankenstone monster in his laboratory.

The classic humor of the prehistoric Flintstones is met with a bevy of Halloween jokes and Frankenstein references for a unique special that stands out from the show.

8Witch’s Night Out

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This one is a true late ’70s gem. First of all, the animation is uniquely freaky. It’s purposely drawn gross and squiggly, making this wholesome cartoon sometimes hard to watch. However, the voice talent is spectacular.

The titular witch is voiced by the one and only Gilda Radner who has been depressed that Halloween isn’t as scary as it used to be. No one wants to be scared anymore, so she feels useless.[3]

Two criminals find the witch’s magic wand, which she threw out in the midst of her Halloween depression, and they use it for ill will. It’s up to the witch and two kids who are at home with a babysitter to stop the criminals from turning the whole town into actual scary monsters to wreak havoc on Halloween.

7Frankenweenie (1984)

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The movie Frankenweenie was released in 2012. But that full-length movie was based on a short film made in 1984 about a boy who revives his dead dog, Sparky, in a Frankenstein-inspired experiment.

The short film, which aired on the Disney Channel and was also called Frankenweenie, is adorable and creepy. It has all the elements of a classic Tim Burton film, except the 1984 version is live action and includes a cute real dog with bolts attached to its neck.[4]

6The Last Halloween

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Starring Rhea Perlman, this 1991 classic mixes Halloween with outer space for an intergalactic Halloween adventure. Two Martians crash-land on Earth during Halloween to get candy for their home planet.

They land in the small town of Crystal Lake, known for its candy factory. However, the scientists at the factory have been draining the town’s candy supply in their efforts to find eternal youth. Since its candy economy is declining, the whole town is relocating its residents, making this the last Halloween.[5]

In only half an hour, all these things are explored as the aliens join forces with two kids having their last Halloween in town before they move away.

5Halloween Is Grinch Night

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The Grinch, a Dr. Seuss character whose time to shine is Christmas, is back, and he also hates Halloween. This special won the Primetime Emmy in 1978 for Outstanding Children’s Program.

Who doesn’t love the Grinch in this spooky return?

When a “sour-sweet wind” blows, it is officially Grinch Night in Whoville. The Grinch and his dog, Max, are set to terrorize Whoville on Grinch Night when they run into a polite little boy who wandered away from town. The Grinch instead shows the boy his “paraphernalia wagon” which is full of monsters drawn in fantastically surreal and eerie animation.[6]

4The Worst Witch

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The Worst Witch is based on a series of books by Jill Murphy and has a lot of similarities to Harry Potter. Fairuza Balk plays a young witch named Mildred Hubble who attends a prestigious school for witches. She’s basically flunking all her classes as she gets bullied by snooty witches and mean teachers.

Mildred is the last person anyone expects to save the school from dangerous rogue witches in the woods. The Worst Witch also has the all-time best cameo anyone could ask for: Tim Curry as a warlock singing a funky ’80s jam about why Halloween is the best day of the year. This alone makes this special well worth the watch.[7]

3The Halloween Tree

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This Cartoon Network special followed four children who sought to learn the origins of Halloween to save their friend’s life from the ghosts of Halloween past. After they meet a magical character who tells them how to save their friend Pip, they go on a worldwide journey through 4,000 years of Halloween history. During their adventure, they encounter the beginnings of many of today’s classic Halloween traditions.[8]

The cartoon is based on a Ray Bradbury book that traced Halloween and Samhain’s historical roots. Luckily, Bradbury also wrote the script for this Emmy-winning adaptation. The special aired in October 1993. Sometimes, it can still be seen on the Cartoon Network around Halloween.

2The Halloween That Almost Wasn’t

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This 1979 live-action special stars Judd Hirsch as Count Dracula. He hears rumors that Halloween might be canceled forever because the monsters just aren’t scary anymore. Watching the TV news, he learns that the blame for Halloween’s end is being placed solely on him.

Upset and worried that he might have to move out of Transylvania to live a more “normal” life, Dracula calls upon his monster friends to fix their images or risk losing Halloween and their scary identities altogether.[9]

This special originally aired on the Disney Channel, where it won an Emmy and was nominated for three more. The film has since been retitled in video releases as The Night Dracula Saved the World.

1Halloweentown

Disney has made several worthwhile made-for-TV Halloween movies, but none is as classic as Halloweentown. This film isn’t necessarily “forgotten.” But it should certainly be more celebrated as a unique, campy, and heartfelt spooktacular ride into the fictional town where Halloween is life.[10]

Around her 13th birthday, Marnie and her siblings visit Grandma in Halloweentown. There, they learn that they come from a family of witches. So they have to come to terms with being witches and learn to harness their powers for good as the family fights against evil that threatens to destroy the world.

Halloweentown has several sequels, but it’s hard to beat the 1998 original.

Stephanie Weber is a comedian and writer whose work has been published in Mental Floss, Slate, The AV Club, Reductress, and much more. She is a writer for Mr. Skin.

]]>10 Silent Movie Stars Too Scandalous For Wordshttp://www.10lists.xyz/10-silent-movie-stars-too-scandalous-for-words/
Fri, 28 Sep 2018 09:45:04 +0000http://listverse.com/?p=379541Today, silent movies appear to have an old-timey innocence about them. Villains twirled mustaches, and damsels were always in distress but always rescued by a handsome hero at the last moment. Even the tramps seemed whimsical. However, behind the camera, the burgeoning film industry was decadent and dissolute. Movie stars made fantastic amounts of money […]]]>

Today, silent movies appear to have an old-timey innocence about them. Villains twirled mustaches, and damsels were always in distress but always rescued by a handsome hero at the last moment. Even the tramps seemed whimsical.

However, behind the camera, the burgeoning film industry was decadent and dissolute. Movie stars made fantastic amounts of money and spent it wildly, mostly, it seems, on drink and drugs. Studios tried hard to keep the scandals out of the press and present a wholesome family image, working their publicity departments at full stretch to not only promote the films but protect their stars.

Given the antics many of them got up to, it was a blessing that they couldn’t talk!

10 William Desmond Taylor

At the height of the silent era, William Desmond Taylor was riding high. A noted film director, he directed 60 films and acted in 27. But on February 1, 1922, he was murdered by an unknown assailant. The scandal that followed almost destroyed the fledgling movie industry.

Taylor had been stabbed repeatedly at his home. There was no sign of a break-in, and cash was found on his body and in the house, which seemed to rule out a burglary gone wrong. There was a 12-hour delay in reporting the death, and when police arrived, they are said to have found studio bosses frantically burning Taylor’s papers.

Witnesses said that the movie star Mabel Normand had been with him that evening, and she was immediately suspected. A large number of rumors circulated about the lifestyle of both Taylor and Normand, including drug dealing, sexual perversion, and even Satanism.

The rumor mill was fueled by Taylor’s mysterious past, not least the fact that his name was not Taylor at all but William Cunningham Dean-Tanner, which is even more of a mouthful. The appearance of the wife and child whom he had deserted in 1908 added fuel to the fire.

There was a long list of suspects as well as 300 people who confessed to the murder despite appearing to have never met Taylor. Mabel Normand was among the chief suspects, and her career never really recovered.[1] Some strenuous attempts were made to implicate a former employee of Taylor’s, but no one was ever charged.

9 Barbara La Marr

Barbara La Marr was nicknamed the “girl who was too beautiful”—too beautiful for Hollywood and, it seemed, too beautiful to live. Her life was always colorful. She was at one time kidnapped by her own sister. A star of 27 silent films, such as The Three Musketeers and The Prisoner of Zenda, La Marr even co-wrote some of her movies.

Her public success was not mirrored in her private life, however. She was married at least four times and had a son whose existence she kept secret. She claimed to sleep for only two hours a night. Whether her rumored drug addiction or her bizarre dietary regimens contributed to her insomnia is unclear.

La Marr, despite her beauty, began to fall out of favor with the studios but continued to work regardless, desperate to regain her popularity. Even a terminal lung condition could not prevent her from working. Finally, one day, she collapsed on set. She died a few months later at the age of 29.[2]

8 Charlie Chaplin

Probably the most famous star of the silent era, Charlie Chaplin is still adored by many today. His Tramp character is one of the most enduring in Hollywood history. His success brought him the kind of wealth he could only have dreamed of during his poverty-stricken childhood. He had a mind for business and set up his own studio, increasing both his profits and his artistic freedom.

Privately, however, Chaplin’s life was much more complicated. He was married several times and was the defendant in a paternity suit. He even bribed a doctor (to the tune of $25,000) to make false entries on the birth certificate of one of his children. More damningly, he is known to have had numerous relationships with women under the age of consent.

Chaplin was denounced as a Communist by the House Un-American Activities committee in 1947, and his star began to dwindle. After a trip to London, his reentry permit was revoked. Knowing that he would have to explain his political views and private life, Chaplin chose not to return and moved to Switzerland. It was a sad end to an illustrious career.[3]

7 Olive Thomas

Olive Thomas began her career as an artist’s model and then as a dancer. She won her first movie contract in 1916 and soon met and married the actor Jack Pickford. The couple seemed to have a glamorous life, though there were signs that, perhaps due to long work-induced separations, things were not going well.[4]

In September 1920, the two went on a second honeymoon to Paris. They are said to have enjoyed a night of high revelry at some of Paris’s more notorious night spots. On returning to their suite at the Ritz, Thomas, for reasons unknown, swallowed a bottle of Pickford’s medicine. It was mercury bichloride, a toxic medication prescribed to Pickford to treat his syphilis. She is said to have called out, “I have taken poison,” though whether or not she meant to poison herself is not clear. Despite attempts to revive her, Olive Thomas died soon after. She was 25 years old.

6 Thomas Ince

Thomas Ince was the world’s first movie mogul. He created the first movie studio and later went on to form Paramount Pictures.

By 1924, he was said to be close to bankruptcy and began to discuss a deal with newspaper tycoon William Randolph Hearst. On November 16, he joined Hearst on his yacht, along with Charlie Chaplin and Hearst’s mistress, Marion Davies, whom Hearst suspected was having an affair with Chaplin.

On board the yacht, the guests celebrated Ince’s 44th birthday. What happened after that is unclear. He was certainly taken off the boat to a hospital, where he died a few days later. The fact that his body was immediately cremated has increased suspicion of foul play. Theories proposed at the time included accidental poisoning, accidental shooting, and deliberate murder.

Ince’s death certificate records the cause of death as heart failure, but newspaper reports of the time declared that he had been shot. Note that those papers belonged to Hearst, who had little to say on the subject. A secretary aboard the yacht claimed to have seen Ince bleeding, and Hearst was suspected of either the deliberate murder of Thomas Ince or the attempted murder of Charlie Chaplin, leading to the accidental shooting of Ince.[5]

There were definite attempts to hush the matter up. Chaplin denied ever having been on the boat, and Ince’s wife was sent on an unexpected trip to Europe after a meeting with Hearst. Hearst offered her a trust fund, and other guests on the boat were given similar inducements to keep their mouths shut.

A further twist came when one of the staff members claimed that Ince had raped her while on board the boat. This might have been dismissed as fantasy, had she not given birth to a child nine months later, before dying almost immediately afterward in a car accident near Hearst’s home. She was found by Hearst’s bodyguards, along with an improbable suicide note. The child was sent to an orphanage under the patronage of Hearst’s mistress. Hmm.

5 Jewel Carmen

Jewel Carmen was an actress with Keystone Studios. Though talented, she appears to have been quite troubled.

She had a long-running legal dispute with the Fox Film Corporation to try to get out of her contract, even signing to a new studio while still tied to Fox. The legal battle took her off the screen for three years, during which her career suffered immeasurably. She married director Roland West in 1918, but their marriage was stormy, and they separated sometime during the 1920s. West began a relationship with actress Thelma Todd, who lived in an adjoining apartment.

In December 1935, Todd was found dead in her garage after inhaling carbon monoxide fumes. Though Carmen and West had been separated for a long time, Carmen was interviewed about her husband’s relationship with Todd. At a grand jury hearing, Carmen even testified that she had seen Thelma Todd the night of her death, traveling in a car with a “dark-appearing” man. It seemed clear that she was trying to implicate her husband in the death, but the grand jury chose to look on it as a case of mistaken identity.[6]

After the scandal, her career never recovered, and Carmen died in obscurity in 1984, remarked by no one.

4 Rudolph Valentino

Rudolph Valentino, the “Latin Lover,” began his working life as a “tango pirate,” dancing with wealthy women. This ended abruptly after a scandal involving a court case, a vice charge, imprisonment, and a murder. He changed his name and moved to California, where he began to pick up film parts. By 1921 Valentino had a starring role in The Sheik, a film which portrayed him as an irresistible lover. It was an image that was to follow him forever.

Further scandals followed, mostly involving women. In 1922, he married his second wife, without having divorced his first, and was charged with bigamy. He had a number of marriages and was said to be engaged again at the time of his death.

Despite this, Valentino was sensitive about insinuations about his sexuality from men, who he felt were jealous of his prowess with women. A headline in the Chicago Tribune describing him as a “Pink Powder Puff” particularly riled him. Valentino challenged the author of the piece to a boxing match, calling him a “contemptible coward.” Though the anonymous author of the piece declined to reveal himself and accept the challenge, Valentino did have a bout with a sports writer who reported that Valentino packed a punch, which did little to soothe the actor.

On August 23, 1926, he collapsed in his hotel, having developed pleuritis in his lung. The insult must have still been playing on his mind, as he asked a doctor, “Am I still a pink powder puff?” Valentino died a few hours after slipping into a coma. He was 31. Over 100,000 people lined the streets for his funeral, and several fans reportedly killed themselves in their grief.[7]

3 Alma Rubens

Today, Alma Rubens is little-remembered as an actress, though she appeared in almost 60 films, including, fittingly, The Regenerates, which is about a woman tormented by drug addiction. By the mid-1920s, Rubens had a heavy morphine and cocaine addiction, and she was replaced on the movie The Torrent by newcomer Greta Garbo.

Rubens was earning large fees for her films, most of which she squandered on drugs. She had several brushes with police and a spell in a mental hospital to try to get clean. Rubens also had three brief marriages in quick succession.

In 1931, she wrote an account of her life, entitled “Why I Remain A Dope Fiend,” which was serialized in newspapers throughout the United States. She died shortly after its publication at 33 years old.[8]

2 Gloria Swanson

Gloria Swanson transcended both silent films and the talkies. Her life is as fascinating as any of her films. She had a uniquely powerful position in Hollywood. She started her own production company, and she was one of the few movie stars of her time to sign a seven-figure contract. And yet Swanson was still a victim of the studio system.

In 1925, Swanson made the film Madam Sans Gene, one of the first movies using American filmmakers abroad. While working on it, she fell in love with a French marquis, though he was still married to her second husband. She became pregnant with the marquis’s baby.

Knowing that her contract contained a morality clause and that she could be banned from working if they discovered the pregnancy, Swanson chose to have an abortion, which almost killed her. She kept the pregnancy a secret from everyone for the sake of her career.

With her private life a mess (she married and divorced six times), Swanson tried to concentrate on her production company. However, her inexperience in choosing her business partners brought her to the brink of bankruptcy, and her career began to wane.

It is perhaps fitting, then, that her most famous role is that of Norma Desmond in Sunset Boulevard, a poignant portrayal of a fading silent film star.[9]

1 Roscoe Arbuckle

The trial of Roscoe Arbuckle is probably one of the most shameful moments in Hollywood history, not just because of the death of a young woman, and the debauchery of the scene where she died, but also because of the way that Arbuckle, commonly known as “Fatty Arbuckle,” was pilloried by a press which seemed to confuse Roscoe Arbuckle the actor with his character on screen. He was accused of killing Virginia Rappe with “external pressure” during forced sex. Medical records showed Miss Rappe died of peritonitis, but the implication made by the prosecution was that Arbuckle ruptured her internal organs by lying on top of her because he was so fat.

Rappe was portrayed in the press as an innocent starlet, despite the fact that she was known to have had a heavy drinking habit, which made her prone to strange outbursts, such as tearing her clothes off at parties, something she had done more than once. She’d recently had an illegal abortion, which had not gone well and may have contributed to the peritonitis and ruptured bladder she subsequently suffered.

Roscoe had to endure three trials before he was finally acquitted. He was portrayed in the press as bestial, with depraved appetites, and his weight (much exaggerated) was seen as evidence of his greedy nature. At each trial, lurid descriptions of the lavish parties he held turned public opinion against him. Though he was finally proved innocent, the revelations during the trial were too much, and Roscoe’s career as a movie star was over.[10]